Bloodrain
by Elemarth
Summary: During the Clone Wars, two Jedi are sent to help bring peace to a city fighting its own civil war, but some passions can run too deep to subdue...
1. Chapter 1

**I'll only do the pronunciation for a few names, because there are so many. You can work out the rest. (Spanish/Japanese vowels, usually accented on the second-to-last syllable, except, for some reason, Lasir and Mibir.)  
**

**Akite: Ah-**_**kee**_**-tay (Wow, I have written that so many times by now! This is her fifth story. But don't worry if you haven't read the rest. This should stand alone.)**

**Jiimo: **_** Jee**_**-moh**

**Okutu: Oh-**_**koo**_**-too**

**Disclaimer: All characters (except a few very recognizable canon characters that are mentioned) are my own creation, along with Okutu and the species Mibir, Hssak, Shinsayama, and Paifei (later chapter). Zabrak and Iridonia are canon, of course.**

**I think it's completely ridiculous to have a disclaimer saying that I don't own Star Wars or have any permission to write about it. I mean, if I did, why would I be wasting my time on a site for fanfiction? I would be making money with books that could be SOLD. Not to mention that, if I was George Lucas, I would never have ruined the Force with midi-chlorians, I would have found a better actor for Anakin in Episode I, and I would have strangled anyone who suggested making Carrie Fisher wear that outfit in Episode VI. I just want to make clear what I did and did not invent.**

**I'm posting this from France. We'll be here for a month. I don't know where we'll be on any given day because my dad is working and my mom and I may or may not go somewhere on weekdays. I can't swear that I'll update every Friday (I didn't manage this one because we had just come), but I'm going to try. I've written this whole story already, so I can do that.**

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**Bloodrain**

Two years after the Battle of Geonosis

* * *

**1**

"There's no way this can be an easy mission," my master warned me as we left Coruscant. "We have more Jedi on Okutu than any other planet right now, and they keep adding more." She smiled grimly.

Our ship jumped to hyperspace, and Coruscant disappeared in a blaze of light. I sighed and looked away from the window. "Why, though?" I asked. "Okutu doesn't have a big population – it's _nothing_ compared to Coruscant or something – and it's not in any strategic location. Why would the Separatists want it?"

"They don't," my master stated. "That's the thing. They _don't_ want it any more than they want any other planet, and neither do we. It's not the Separatists we'll be fighting. It's the people, and it's mostly one city – Kebro, which is sort of the second capital of the planet."

I gave her a blank look. The Council hadn't told us this. They hadn't told us much of anything, really, as if they trusted us to know what to do. At least _one_ of us did.

"You really need a lesson on Okutu, don't you?" my master asked, laughing. "Okay. Let's see…"

My master is Moyek Yasi, a notoriously hardheaded Zabrak Jedi Master and a semi-legendary lightsaber duelist. She has light gold skin and black eyes. Her particular race of Zabrak doesn't have hair, and her horns are small and high on her head. She is from Iridonia, our homeworld, and she has Iridonian coming-of-age tattoos across her cheeks and chin. We get along fairly well, but she's very strict. Iridonian Zabrak tend to be fiercer than those from colonial worlds.

My name is Akite Chairu. I'm a Zabrak, too, but I'm from one of the colonial worlds and a different race than Moyek. My horn pattern is different from hers, and I have shoulder-length black hair. I have dark brown skin, and I don't have tattoos. The community I was born in doesn't do that, and I've never wanted to leave the Jedi even for a few months to learn the ways of the Zabrak and come of age by _their_ standards. I'm fine with the Jedi's standards. I'm fifteen and have been Moyek's apprentice for about two years, since my first master, the knight Oreti Alo, died in the Battle of Geonosis.

Okutu is one of the middle worlds. We had an eight-hour flight through hyperspace, so I had plenty of time to learn about the planet.

Okutu is a pieced-together sort of planet. There are no native sentient species, so no one had a proper claim on it. Now, however, there are four major species besides the omnipresent Humans (what is it about them that makes them so much better than the rest of us?), two of which have communities nowhere else in the galaxy. One of the groups is the Zabrak, which Moyek says is why we were sent there.

The first of these species to settle, the Hssak, arrived two thousand years ago. The last, the Mibir, were sent there fifteen hundred years ago. Since the Republic is only a thousand years old, the various species had centuries to clash before anyone effectively controlled them. They had taken their first chance to start fighting again and were completely out of control.

The government on Okutu wouldn't allow clones on the planet. The battle droids and mass destruction that the troops have been trained to fight against wasn't occurring there, anyway. The people fight on the streets. The Hssak and Zabrak have warrior traditions on their homeworlds and the Mibir had learned well. There are police on the planet, but they aren't trained well enough to handle everything. There is a militia, too, but they are new, just formed and only for Kebro, and even worse at this.

It wasn't all species against species, though. There could be members of the same species fighting each other or members of different species fighting on one side. Nobody knew which factions have leaders and which just like to fight, and nobody knew whether Separatists are involved and trying to tie up the Jedi.

It was a mess. We were sent to help.

Sounded like fun.

Sounded like a Jedi's life.

* * *

"At least I might get to see Jiimo or Fang," I sighed once Moyek finished telling me about the planet. That seemed to be the one possible bright point. Jiimo and Fang are two of my friends, and I hadn't seen Jiimo more than once in the past year.

"Don't count on it," Moyek warned. "There are so many Jedi there. You never know who you'll see or in what sort of situation."

That was true, and I knew it. "I'm just amazed that three of us will be in the same city at once. Especially Jiimo."

Moyek laughed. "His master seems to like to be in the thick of things. He would never forgive the Council if he didn't get some time on Okutu. Not that the Council would or should care. And don't," she added sharply, "delude yourself by thinking that they planned you three to be together. They aren't like that."

"I know. Fang always seems to show up where I am, though." When I was stuck in the Temple after the Battle of Geonosis, he was called there because we didn't have enough healers and his master is a healer as well as a knight. This pattern has repeated twice, plus this time, and we run into each other a lot.

Thinking of Jiimo and Fang made me think of my other friends. The journey was long, so I had plenty of time for that.

There used to be five of us. I'm not sure how many there are now. One of us, Dorn, died in the Battle of Geonosis. My best friend, Zefel, was captured by the Separatists and hasn't been herself since.

Her farewell to me stuck in my head. "It's not going to matter in the end, you know. We'll all die, and it won't matter."

She's been like that since she came back, but it's been worse lately. The Council has her master working on Coruscant so he and Zefel have to come back to the Temple every day. That way, the masters can keep an eye on her.

"But it does matter, right?" I asked Moyek as we traveled.

"I don't know what your friend has been seeing when she meditates, but her vision is limited," Moyek told me. "Even if we lose the war and all die, it will matter eventually. Everything we do has an impact in the long term."

"Zefel keeps saying that the Jedi will _all_ be dead soon," I added worriedly. "All of us. And people do say that she has visions. They always have."

Moyek gave me a searching look. "The present is what matters, Akite. If we're all gone next week, I'm sorry, but we're going to do our best to end the violence while we can.

"Besides," she added, "Time is relative. 'Soon' can be a thousand years from now. That's a short period from the Force's perspective. Don't let Zefel's pessimism get to you. We have a lot of work to do."

Yes, we did.


	2. Chapter 2

**2**

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**Please review. Unless you're a meteorologist or weapons specialist. I don't want to hear about unrealisticness. Thank you.**

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It was raining when we arrived.

From space, the planet was ordinary – blue and green and white. As we came closer to our target, though, I began to see a lot of red. There was a thin cloud cover, which was pink. The ground was rust-colored. The landing pad seemed to be clean, but as we got closer, I noticed something interesting. When the water hit the landing pad, it collected in rivulets that were close to scarlet.

The rain was red.

Our ship rolled into the hanger before we got out, so we stayed dry. We were greeted by an interesting group of people. A male Zabrak with somewhat long horns (my longest are about as long as the width of four fingers together), dark gold skin, and no hair seemed to be in charge. He wore flowing, rich green robes. Standing just behind him, as I am taught to stand with Moyek, was what appeared to be a very tall, slender male human – over two meters (six and a half feet). He had to be a Mibir, a race that scientists took a hundred years to engineer before realizing that nobody wanted them around. I wish I could say that this sort of meddling in genetics doesn't happen in the Republic, but our army _is_ made up of genetically manufactured clones.

A little farther back was a Hssak, which somehow didn't appear quite as odd to my eyes, since I'm used to seeing very strange aliens. It's just the first-glance similarity to Humans that bothers me with the Mibir. The Hssak was about as tall as Moyek, who is about 1.8 meters (almost six feet). It had a flattish nose, large eyes, and very long ears. It had long, tawny hair and long-fingered hands. From under its robes, I could see clawed feet and a long, thin tail

Well behind them were a Human, another Hssak, and a protocol droid.

Moyek is usually very polite when greeting foreign dignitaries. I had learned that a glance in her direction almost always told me what to do. If she was doing something wrong, it usually was clearly on purpose. This was different, however. Ignoring them, she turned to the side of the ship and began studying the red raindrops on it as if the ship were more important than the people were.

Confused, I bowed and glanced at her again. She gave me no hints.

The Zabrak and Mibir smiled. "Don't trouble yourself with that," the Zabrak said. He had a slight accent. "The _samudhu_ has come down nearly every day of the wet season since long before we came, and, hopefully, will continue long after we are gone. It does no more damage than ordinary rain does, and we will have your ship cleaned."

Moyek touched the side of the ship cautiously, then studied her finger. "What, exactly…?"

"The local dialect calls it _samudhu,_" the Mibir explained. He had a clear, soft voice that was high by a Human male's standards and a somewhat more noticeable accent than the Zabrak's. "Translated to Basic, _samudhu_ would be close to 'bloodrain.' It is simply an anomaly of our area of the planet. When the rain ceases, you will see the _samudri_, the blood-dust. It covers most everything. It is extraordinarily fine, and it manages to float in the air and collect in clouds. During the damp season, which we are in the midst of, the air is simply too heavy, and the bloodrain falls every day."

Moyek finally faced them. "And in the non-damp season?"

_Is she making fun of his accent? What's_ wrong _with her?_ I wondered. Now, I wonder if she was having her own premonitions.

"During the dry season, the dust falls on its own, but the air can grow thick with it." He smiled.

Moyek looked skeptical. "Isn't it hard to have your second most important city in a place where this happens? I'm sorry, but doesn't it ever get hard to breathe?"

"Occasionally," the Mibir responded with a nod. "We stay indoors throughout the worst days. You will notice that there are few Shinsayama in this part of the world, as they dislike dry weather."

The Shinsayama is the fourth main race on Okutu, a herbivorous species that was driven off its homeworld by invaders about eighteen hundred years ago. It occurred to me that their presence might be the reason that the capital city was much more peaceful than Kebro.

Suddenly, Moyek seemed to remember what etiquette is, bowed, and introduced us. The Zabrak, who called himself the High Governor, introduced the three of them. The Mibir was the chief of security of the city and was called Tiku Chisu Lasir. "Tiku" is a title in Okutushu, the planet's language, for a high-ranking governmental official other than the governor. The Hssak was the chief of otherworld affairs.

After we went into the main building, the High Governor and the Hssak slipped off with the Human and the protocol droid, leaving us with Tiku Lasir and the other Hssak, presumably an aide.

Tiku Lasir led us through the High Governor's palace at a pace that must have seemed normal to him, with his long legs, but was difficult for me to match. The palace was something that you would expect for a planet's capital, not the second capital, as this was called, but Moyek had told me that Okutu had grown wealthy, as planets go, during the millennium of peace.

As we walked, Tiku Lasir told us all about the situation. He was really very good – he gave us thorough explanations and occasionally paused in his otherwise steady monologue as if to wait for questions. Moyek never had any. I could feel her fixing everything he said into her mind for future use. I tried to do the same, but I'm not so good.

At one point, an explosion literally made the building tremble. I stopped walking, but the Force did not warn me of any danger. Moyek and Tiku Lasir stopped, too, Moyek moving subtly to be at the ready, and the chief of security calmly turning to the Hssak, who was behind me. "Would you please find out if that was aimed at the palace?" he asked so serenely that I thought he should have been a Jedi.

The Hssak pulled out a comlink and spoke into it with a hissing, crackling language. I noticed its sharp teeth and fangs just a bit uncomfortably. Plenty of aliens have bigger teeth than Zabrak and Humans do, but it still looks wrong to me.

Tiku Lasir was silent until it turned back to us and spoke to him in the same language.

He nodded. "Good." He explained to us, "Our guards believe that the explosive was aimed at another group of people, not the palace or its fence. One thing you must know is that our people often use simple, old-fashioned explosives. They do not appreciate lasers or energy bombs. Our explosives can cause terrible wounds of their own sort, so you must never underestimate them."

It turned out that they also used deadmetal knives and other such weapons, which, of course, would be no match for a lightsaber, but could cause much more blood loss. Their only energy weapons were blasters, which are equally messy.

We ended up at the rooms where we would sleep if the Force ever granted us that privilege. Another explosion was heard outside.

"Not _again_," Tiku Lasir sighed. "They are unusually violent this afternoon. That was the second in twenty minutes."

The Hssak hissed.

"Thirty, I apologize. Would you find out what that was aimed at?" The Hssak obediently hissed into its comlink. Its report made the Mibir nod in satisfaction. "Not us, yet."

"I think we need to start on the streets," Moyek said calmly. The Mibir nodded in agreement.

_Two explosions in thirty minutes and we're going outside?!_


	3. Chapter 3

3

**3**

The bloodrain was still dripping down as we left the palace. Everything was bathed in reds, from pink to scarlet to brick. The ground in front of the palace was on the scarlet side, like real blood.

As we stood just inside the gate before leaving its safety, Moyek looked out and sighed. "The good news is that the streets are on one level, unlike Coruscant. The bad news –"

A Zabrak ducked as Mibir threw something at her. That something exploded just behind her, sending up a cloud of scarlet dust.

"Only a few meters from the palace," Moyek sighed as the guards drove the fighters away. "Oh, _Force_. Okay, let's go."

The good thing about a master like Moyek, not Oreti, my former one, is that Moyek knows exactly what she is doing, and everyone can tell. Just the sight of a fierce female Zabrak wielding a lightsaber was enough to tame many of the fighters, at least temporarily.

They would probably attack each other again once we were out of sight down the red, damp streets. Tiku Lasir had cautioned us against taking weapons. Disarming Zabrak or Mibir would leave them defenseless to attackers. We couldn't get everyone. More would always come. We were supposed to take any explosives we found, but they could kill us. It felt terrible to just keep walking, but we did.

The second group of people we broke up had two Hssak in full battle mode. They wore very little in the way of clothes and had thin coats of fur and long hair down their head and neck. They had short claws on their hands and long ones on their feet and crouched on all fours once we separated them. Their teeth were bared, and I decided that I did _not_ want to make anyone with those teeth angry. They had long, hairless tails that lashed around their back legs and looked like they could break bones.

Those things didn't _need_ weapons. Moyek took two knives from them. I don't think I'd ever seen a deadblade before, but that was not the time to look at them.

As we turned away from them, I saw something that literally took my breath and thoughts of Hssak away. It was a Mibir, my first view of what Mibir really look like.

It was about two meters tall, like the chief of security, and it stood with its back to us a few meters down the street. As I watched, it unfurled its wings.

You see, Mibir can fly. Under Tiku Lasir's all-concealing robes are wings, too. Wings like _this_.

Each one must have been as long as the Mibir was tall and half as wide. They stretched from one side of the street to another, effectively blocking the way.

"_Akite_," Moyek snapped. "Let's see who she's intimidating. Mibir are supposed to be good at that. Too bad none are Force-sensitive."

(Moyek didn't know whether it was a he or she – in fact, it was male – but she always talks in female pronouns if she isn't sure.)

The Mibir was standing over a male human. We pulled him away and moved on.

Moyek didn't need my help. I was just an extra lightsaber's worth of intimidation, not much more. So I paid attention to our surroundings on Moyek's behalf.

Kebro was so different from any layer of any sector of Coruscant that I couldn't believe it was the second capital of a planet. The buildings were only five to ten stories high. There were no walkways above ground. The people I saw walked on the streets, usually in groups with others of their race. I could see why they used the streets, though. This was probably the greatest difference between Kebro and Coruscant besides size. On Coruscant, you see a thousand ships in every direction. Here, I did not see one vehicle. Not one.

We had been out for about three hours when both of us felt the presence of other Force-users nearby. Without having to discuss it, we both turned towards the feeling. We hadn't seen any Jedi yet; the only pair in the palace had been asleep. It would be good to "check in" with some.

The two were male Humans. They had sensed us and, as we had, moved towards the sense.

I didn't recognize either one – the apprentice was older than I was – but Moyek did. She and the master bowed to each other. "How is your work going, Master Tirem?" she asked.

"Well, we've been out for about six hours," he replied with a tired smile. "We haven't had any major problems except that the fighting starts again once we leave."

Moyek nodded in understanding. "I can't tell if we're doing any good. We're not even disarming them."

"I wonder the same thing," Master Tirem admitted. "I like recruiting better, but that job is supposed to be over for now. Speaking of that, have you been to Sechiru or Onasik yet?"

"I've heard of them, but I don't know where to find them," Moyek explained.

One of the things that the Jedi did here for a few months was recruiting former fighters to help bring order. The Sechiru and Onasik shelters are headquarters for them and a stopping place for the Jedi in this section of the city.

"You need to learn where they are," the Human advised. "They might be closer than the palace when you have a problem, and they're the best place for food."

"Shouldn't we be patrolling?" Moyek asked.

I watched the other Jedi's expression change from the assurance of somebody who was helping a newcomer to a place he knew well to the discomfort of a Jedi who realized that he was about to disagree with someone more experienced and famous than he was. "I – I think you should learn where they are. We aren't far from Sechiru. But, of course, we shouldn't stand here or someone will think we _aren't_ patrolling."

"Let's _move_, then," Moyek suggested.

We followed Master Tirem down the red streets. The ground had dried, and puffs of dust followed us.

"Why _did_ they make a city here?" I wondered aloud.

"I think they like to challenge themselves and prove that they can succeed," said Master Tirem's apprentice. We were a little behind our masters.

"Huh. I don't see _why_."

"Well…" He kicked dust at a child by the road and scowled at her. She scampered into a building. "This part of the planet is mainly Mibir and Zabrak, though Hssak are everywhere on the planet. The Mibir were never supposed to be a species on their own – an experiment in genetics, really – so they got a case of pride worse than the Zabrak. I've _heard_ –" He emphasized the last word carefully. "– that Zabrak like to challenge themselves and prove skeptics wrong. Anyway, aren't Zabrak from a desert? They would feel right at home with the dust."

"I guess so." _I_ didn't, but I grew up in the clean, sand-less Temple.

"What's your name, anyway?" he asked.

"Oh – Akite. And you?"

"Jans."

I felt Moyek go on guard, and we both hurried to join our masters. It was nothing, at least by the time we got there. We intercepted two more fights before Master Tirem stopped in front of an apparently abandoned building. The windows were all broken, and there were marks in the walls where explosives had apparently damaged it, but we had seen buildings in far worse shape that day. The door was stuck mostly open. Moyek and I followed the two Humans inside.

**If anyone is reading, I'd like just **_**one**_** review…**


	4. Chapter 4

4

**4**

Nothing much was intact inside the Sechiru building. There was a dusty metal thing that could have once been a reception desk and also a clearly broken elevator. I don't think there was anything mobile.

"This used to be an apartment building, mainly for Zabrak," Master Tirem told us. "When the wars started, it was mostly abandoned. The few Zabrak that stayed through the first grenades offered it to us."

"Careful of the broken glass," Jans warned. "There's some left by the windows.

"It was like this when we came." Master Tirem looked around contentedly. "We tried to fix it at first, but it's a lost cause. The people kept throwing explosives in our direction. They only have a vague distaste for us, but we decided to move underground all the same." He started to move to the left side of the room.

"Master, wait," Jans said quietly. He raised his head and called, "Ara-Sini?"

"Yes, I forgot," his master admitted. "Thanks."

Jans's call was replied to with a hiss and a click from below us. "We have some Hssak here," Master Tirem announced.

"Ara-Sini is a sort of greeting," Jans explained. "It's not a secret pass or anything – anyone could hear us – but it's polite to announce our presence."

Moyek nodded.

Master Tirem pushed a door open – yes, pushed. I doubt anything could slide in that place. He headed down the stairs.

There was a large room at the bottom, mostly empty except for a group of Hssak lounging in the corner and one hissing to Master Tirem. The Jedi was frowning slightly, concentrating. He nodded finally and said, "Thank you for taking care of that." He turned to us. "This is Asshik and his i'akaa – 'itaka' in Okutushu – his group. Not exactly like a gang – more an alliance, though they've obviously gotten more violent lately."

The main Hssak bent forwards as if bowing.

"This is Jedi Master Moyek Yasi and her apprentice, Akite Chairu," Master Tirem said slowly. To us, he added, "With a lot of the people here, it's best to talk very clearly. They understand Basic a bit, but they have trouble with our accent. You'll also have to learn some Hssaki and Okutushu to understand what's happening."

We bowed deeply to the Hssak. They looked down and curled their tails around their feet.

"That means respect," the Jedi explained. "On the street, eye contact is a threat from a Hssak."

Master Tirem showed us where we could get food, water, a change of clothes, and electricity to recharge our lightsabers. They were all hidden where only somebody who knew where they were could find them. "Occasionally, Hssak bring food here, but we made a rule that they have to eat it right away," Master Tirem told us. "They're having trouble getting enough, so we're trying to get a freezer or something so the rest of us can't see or smell it if it has to be stored."

That was probably a good idea. They eat raw, preferably bloody, meat, and I wouldn't like to be close to that.

That was when something occurred to me. "Why haven't we seen any dead bodies? They're fighting on the streets…"

"One of two things happens," Master Tirem said. "If it's a big explosion, the police or militia clean it up. If it's a small explosion or a fight, the winners throw any dead bodies into the nearest open building."

"And – and _leave_ it there?"

"More or less. Most people are gone. Nobody will clean up."

"You won't notice the blood, anyway," Jans added. "Not with the blood-dust everywhere."

I just stared at him. That was disgusting. That was _sick_. He had been on Okutu too long if he could say _that_ so easily.

I didn't like the planet at all.

"Ara-Sini!" shouted a hoarse voice above us. I shook my horror off. The Hssak hissed and clicked. The two Humans called back, "Aya!"

The door was pushed open. Three people stumbled down the stairs, two trying to carry a third. Master Tirem leapt up the stairs, followed by Jans. They took the body from the other two and took it down to the floor.

"Close the door," Master Tirem snapped. A Hssak leapt across the room with two boxes in his hands.

The two Humans knelt by the limp body. Moyek and I looked over their heads. It was a small Mibir, its wings twisted, covered in drying blood.

"He'll live. I can't tell about his wings yet. Go clean yourself up," Master Tirem said to the Mibir's companions. "We can take care of him," he added to us.

We backed away. One of the people who had carried the Mibir headed to the back, where the water was kept. He was a male Zabrak, my age or a little older. His skin, horns, and clothes were all covered with the red blood-dust. The other, who still hovered over the Humans, was a female Mibir, Moyek's height. She wore a shirt that had nothing in the back except ties around her neck, just under her wings, and around her waist. Her wings hung limply, trailing on the floor. She, too, was covered with blood-dust.

"I said, clean up," the Human Jedi snapped. "Standing over us will only distract me."

The girl nodded and crossed the room to the Zabrak.

The Zabrak boy shouted, almost cheerfully, "I realize that there isn't much water in the city, but couldn't you change the washing-water a _little_ more often?"

A Hssak replied with something that sounded like scolding, though I couldn't exactly tell. The Zabrak shouted back with defiant-sounding words that must have been in Okutushu.

I watched the Humans clean and bandage the Mibir's wings and shoulders. They finished as the Mibir girl came out of the washroom.

"All right?" she asked.

"We'll have to get him to a medcenter to save his wings, but he'll live," the Jedi said, standing. The girl nodded, looking at the ground. I felt a wave of pain from her.

The Zabrak came from the washroom, looking marginally cleaner and much wetter. I couldn't tell whether his skin was brick red or brown but stained with sand. He had the same horns as the High Governor and the other male Zabrak I had seen that day. His black eyes flicked around the room and rested on Moyek and me for a moment.

"What did this to him?" the Human asked, indicating the injured boy, who was beginning to move.

"Mibir-Human _itaka_."

"Where's the rest of _your itaka_?"

"Chasing them. Could we –" He tipped his head towards us.

"Master Yasi, this is Daru Onhu, leader of a Zabrak-Mibir teenage group."

"It has a Shinsayama and two Humans," Daru corrected him quickly.

"Probably the last Shinsayama on the streets. This is Kerai…"

"Just Kerai," Daru said. I would learn that many of the fighters only shared their first names.

"Daru, this is Jedi Master Moyek Yasi and her apprentice, Akite Chairu."

He smiled at us for a moment, but it was clearly strained. "We need to get him to a medcenter, right?" he asked. "How? Can you help?"

"No, Daru, it's too far, and we need to get back to patrolling. You'll have to take him."

Daru looked down at the boy. He was sitting against Jans's arm. The girl asked something in Okutushu. Daru turned to the group of Hssak and asked something else. The leader hissed back.

"Okay. Some of them will come."

"Good. Jans?"

The Human boy lifted the Mibir one to his feet carefully. Daru took one of his arms and Kerai took the other, and they slowly began to move to the stairs. Two Hssak followed.

The boy mumbled to Jans. "Just get better," the Human replied cheerfully.

"Look out for emergency workers on the way, and send a note to the palace if you need money," Master Tirem told Daru and Kerai.

Daru turned back. "Thanks – I'll see you. This area's ours. We're always around."

Master Tirem smiled at him. "He's wonderful," he whispered to us. "So are those Hssak. I wish there were more… But especially Daru, because he's still a kid and he's absolutely dedicated to unity. There are some Zabrak-Mibir groups, but not many with _four_ species."

"We need to get back to work, don't we?" asked Moyek.

We all agreed. Back to the world of blood and dust…

**I feel like I'm writing into a black hole! A review would be nice, so I know that there's some point in writing…**

**Happy Fourth of July for any American readers!**


	5. Chapter 5

**5**

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**I flew back from France last Friday, and I was too tired to post that night or Saturday. Anyway, here it is. Thanks to "wbsaw" for reviewing!**

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We were covered with sand by the time we got back to the palace. I would have liked to spend a few hours in the shower, but water was precious in Kebro, even in the palace. We showered quickly, just until the water was no longer tinted pink from the blood-dust. We got to eat as much as we wanted, though.

We had to report to Tiku Lasir after that. He spent the time leaning back in his chair, completely relaxed and smiling faintly. Moyek did almost all the talking, so I got to just think about how glad I was that he allowed us to sit. The Council makes Jedi stand no matter how long they've been on their feet.

I couldn't help thinking about wings. We had seen many Mibir that day, and their wings had always been immediately noticeable. It already seemed odd to see one with his wings hidden. It was just as odd to see his Hssak aide, who was in a corner, with its blue robe covering most of its fur and tail. It seemed so unnatural. You can't hide a Zabrak's horns. Why should you be able to hide the defining aspects of a Mibir or Hssak?

But, of course, that was the point of it. The people at the palace were supposed to be above speciesism, so they pretended that they were all alike. And they had to dress like this to do that.

I must have been staring at Tiku Lasir as I tried to imagine him with his wings spreading to fly, because he looked at me and smiled as if he could read my thoughts.

When Moyek finished, he asked if I had anything to add or ask. There was nothing more for me to tell him, but I had many questions, and not all easy to express. I chose one that I knew how to ask. "Why aren't there any vehicles – besides the first-aid people and police – or droids?"

"Why there are no vehicles," he said slowly. "If there were, where would anybody fight? The roads would be too dangerous. We began to see vehicles being bombed a few weeks into the fighting. Everybody either moved away or started using their feet or wings.

"Why there are no droids," he continued. "Droids take jobs from workers who must make money to live. We do not like droids here. We are wealthy for it, or _were_ wealthy before the war began."

"Okay," I said. "But you make it sound like they like this, like they cleared the streets because they wanted to fight, and they agreed on it."

He raised his eyebrows. "Do they _not_ enjoy fighting? Do they have reason to fight? Any reason but culture and pride and history?"

The Hssak hissed to him.

"Yes," he agreed. "She is correct. That is the question – the question – what do they say? That is the question worth a million credits to answer. _Is_ there another reason why they fight? We do not know."

He leaned forwards. "But understand this, because few do. Understand that in the thousand years of peace, the fighting never ceased entirely. It has changed its form. In neighborhoods or schools, the children would battle. Hssak fought each other while they were young enough for soft claws. Zabrak practiced martial arts together. Mibir would compete for the largest wings and fastest flight – I always won when I was young." He sighed, perhaps sadly. "Children formed teams and competed for anything they could. Humans were shunned – they did not know how to fight – droids sabotaged, and small, usually worthless, explosives built in yards."

He leaned back and closed his eyes. "Those were childish games. We thought nothing of them. Perhaps we should have, as the games of children demonstrate a society. What we did notice, and banned only nine years ago, was adult competition. It was common for political rivals on campaign or on opposite sides of an issue to physically compete. Mibir raced and Hssak fought with blunted claws. Though safety grew ever better, combatants were injured or killed. On no other planet within the Outer rim would you find this." He opened his eyes and looked at me. "What do you think?"

"I – I don't think I like this planet much," I admitted.

He smiled. "Odd, is it not, that I love it."

* * *

"Moyek?" I called through my master's door. She had disappeared into her room as soon as we had finished talking to Tiku Lasir.

The door slid open. She was yawning. She had been wide awake two minutes before. It's amazing how quickly she can change.

"I want to see if they have any useful archives."

"Not _sleep_? You must be crazy. Okay, but you better come back in two hours and go _straight_ to sleep." She yawned again.

"Okay, I'll try."

She wasn't too tired to give me a stern look.

"Sorry. I _will_."

I found the archives quickly enough, but when I asked permission to use them, the archive-keeper stared at me.

"I'm a Jedi. I'm allowed to see most records," I reminded her.

"But you're…" She pointed to my padawan braid. "You're a student, right?" She didn't have the same awkward Basic as most other people I had met, though she had an unfamiliar accent.

"Uh – yeah. But I'm still a Jedi."

"Why do you want to see archives?"

"Because I don't know much about this planet."

"But – okay, you can see the public records, like what we show on the holonets. I just don't see why you _want_ to."

"Can I see a record of the city's recent history? As in the past few years? Are there records of major disturbances? Bombs?"

She shook her head. "There are, but I can't let you see that sort of thing without permission.

"Why not?" I asked, somewhat annoyed.

"You aren't a Jedi knight. You're a student."

"I'm a _Jedi_. It doesn't matter much if I'm a student when we're working."

"I can't let you see that sort of records without permission from the chief of security."

I glared at her. She was a Zabrak, so mind tricks wouldn't work, even if I could do them well, which I can't. I turned around without gracing her with another word and walked away.

What I really wanted was a map showing where major problems had occurred recently. I wanted to see where they concentrated. I wanted to know if there were any people who would have pushed the populace to start fighting each other. I didn't believe it was all culture. But I needed a visual because I don't know how to use my gift – shatterpoints, like Master Windu –without one.

I had been stalking through the palace for a few minutes when something told me to stop. I realized that I was in front of the room where we had spoken to the chief of security. Through the window, I could see him watching someone report via with that Hssak (well, it could have been another; I honestly couldn't tell) standing nearby.

_I love you, Force,_ I thought. I was where I needed to be.

Tiku Lasir turned the hologram projector off and said something to his aide. It came to the door. I realized that it would have been polite to make my presence known, even if he _was_ busy.

The door slid open and the Hssak said something. When I stared blankly, it repeated it. I realized that it was speaking Basic – the first Hssak I had heard do so – with an extremely heavy accent. "Ee-you 'ish to s'eak to Tiku?"

I nodded, wide-eyed. It extended a hand, indicating for me to come in.

Tiku Lasir was smiling faintly. "I just saw you, did I not?"

"I'm sorry. I wanted to look at some things in the archives, but I'm not allowed to see much without your permission. Because I'm a padawan."

"I had believed that we had left our bureaucrats on Coruscant," he said to himself. "What, exactly, do you wish to learn?"

"I want to learn about the city, see a map, find out where the most dangerous places are, and, if I'm allowed to, whether any people have been repeatedly involved in recent problems."

"If you wish to find who is causing our problems, I must remind you that we have spent much time on this issue already."

"I know."

"I see no reason why you should not be allowed to satisfy your curiosity, though we hardly know who is responsible for any occurrences. I will tell our archive-keeper." He pulled out a small comlink and spoke in Okutushu for a minute or so. He then told me, "You may access any records that are not considered secret. However," he smiled. "Why _is_ it you and not your master who wishes to use our archives?"

I shrugged. "Strategy. I see the ways… Everything is connected through the Force, and there are places where the threads come together just right so that you can pull one and everything unravels. A few Jedi can see these points easily and the rest can hardly find them at all. I can see them, and she can't."

"Do you think that you can use this to help us?" the Mibir asked, sounding interested.

"Probably not," I admitted. "I think I need to try, though."

"Good luck."


	6. Chapter 6

**6**

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**Sorry, I meant to post yesterday night, but I forgot.**

**Thanks to Maiyri for the review!**

* * *

Maps were probably the only really useful thing I found in the archives. I finally could picture the city.

The strange thing was that the poorest districts were silent. Anyone who lived there just wanted to live. Noncombatants from the worse places that hadn't left the city altogether moved there for access to food. The two places where there was trouble were the eastern quarter or so where the palace was and the northwest reach, where Jiimo was working. That place was reportedly far more violent than ours – as many deaths as in the eastern district in a fifth of the area. I didn't envy Jiimo.

I obediently went to bed after two hours. _Maybe tomorrow…_ I thought. _But I have to rest._

As I fell into sleep, I thought of what Oreti would say. _The only way to learn is to do… You have to get out there and experience it._

Outside, the bloodrain fell.

* * *

I didn't want to go outside that morning. I wasn't ready for the red world. I wanted to stay in the palace where everything was in shades of green, blue, silver, or gold, and red and orange were nowhere to be seen.

"Akite, I told you to come," Moyek snapped.

I reluctantly followed her outside. Even the courtyard was covered with the red dust. The outside of the palace, despite the best efforts of the cleaning droids that had been allowed to work because they could do a better job than any living thing, was tinted pink, and every leaf of every plant had a coat of the fine sand.

"How can people live here and see this every day of their lives?" I moaned.

"Well, we'll find out, because we're here until the Council says otherwise," Moyek reminded me.

I decided not to think about that.

The streets were even more violent that morning than they had been before. We hardly got twenty blocks from the palace whereas last time, we had reached past Onasik, sixty-five blocks away.

We had been out an hour or so and were trying to stop three Hssak from tearing some Humans apart without killing or crippling anyone when the buildings shook from a double explosion.

Once we got the blood-dust out of our throats and eyes, we saw the Hssak running towards the origin of the blast on all fours and the Humans creeping in the other direction. We silently agreed to go find out what had happened.

There was a large and diverse crowd gathered, but they let us through because of our lightsabers. One explosion had been in the middle of the street, the other, apparently larger, in a building that had collapsed on itself. There were at least ten bodies that weren't moving, the first dead bodies I had seen on Okutu.

Jedi don't think about that. Moyek started trying to convince the crowd to break up, but the militia came soon after we did and decided to try to do their job. I went from one body to another, finding out who was alive. Once the emergency workers came, I switched to guarding them as they worked to save the injured.

I spun to see something small and black arching towards me. _Never use a lightsaber to block a non-energy weapon,_ Moyek had told me, so I raised a hand and stopped it in midair.

I didn't manage to stop it from exploding.

The power of the blast knocked me backwards. I kept my feet, but I didn't notice the second grenade until it was right in front of me.

And there it stopped. There was not time to wonder why. I rolled away and wrapped my arms around my head, as if that could have helped me.

The explosion, however, wasn't nearly as strong as I had expected. It almost seemed as if it had happened far away.

Moyek? Had she managed to get it away from me?

I rolled to my feet, but my legs dropped me to the ground again. Once my mind cleared, I stood up and looked around.

There was Fang looking down at me.

I hadn't seen Fang in eight months – he had only been back on Coruscant form Okutu once during that time, and I had been somewhere else. I was astonished at his appearance.

His hair had grown to shoulder-length, which was a shock. His face, serious as ever, seemed more adult. He had gained at least five centimeters, not that I should have been surprised at that. He was almost two meters tall, and his growth never seemed to slow.

What really struck me was how much he looked like a Mibir, despite his lack of wings or the black hair that nearly every Mibir has. His hair is the same color as his skin and eyes – gold. Right then, it was dusted with red, which actually looked good on him.

He threw his long padawan braid over his shoulder. Unlike Zefel and me, he had only ever had one master, so his braid had grown continuously for four years. "Push grenades as high in the air as you can," he advised. "You can't stop them once the pin is pulled."

"Thanks," I replied, and that was all. I left the wounded to Fang and his master, Asyi Sual. That was their job.

Moyek and I managed to break up half the crowd before a fight broke out between some Zabrak and Mibir. Moyek had to pull them apart with the Force, and only the threat of my lightsaber kept others from joining them.

By the time we thought it was safe to hand the situation to the militia, Fang and Master Sual were gone. I could only hope that we would have a chance to talk sometime soon.

A light rain began to fall, creating a reddish haze. The dusty roads turned into what looked like bloody rivers.

The good thing about the spells of bloodrain is that there are fewer fights. We got to relax for fifteen minutes.

Once the sky cleared, we went on.


	7. Chapter 7

**7**

Later that afternoon, we ran into Daru Onhu and several of his _itaka_. We thought we were headed to a larger-than-usual fight. Instead, we found a group of teenaged Zabrak and Mibir trying to take grenades and blasters from a group of Hssak, who were resisting, while Daru tried to make an adult Hssak give him a hint as to where the weapons had come from. Hssak don't need any.

I was reluctant to interfere – Daru was in a position that looked like he could be cut open if he was distracted for an instant – but Moyek walked right in, her lightsaber ignited, and bellowed, "Put the weapons in a pile _right here, right now_!"

Most of the Hssak froze, but the kids didn't. Their work was finished within a minute. I ignited my lightsaber and brought it close enough to Daru's Hssak that it could feel heat. It started hissing and clicking more rapidly, but Daru didn't look pleased. Finally, he said, "Hold your sword there, Akite." He added something threatening to the Hssak in Okutushu. It hissed back angrily.

Daru had been holding it against a building with what looked like a hollow durasteel staff and his own elbows and left foot. Don't ask me how he wasn't killed. As I held my lightsaber to the Hssak's neck, he leapt backwards, yelled something in Okutushu, and threw the staff to another Zabrak boy, who caught it easily. Privately, I was impressed.

Daru stood back. "He says he doesn't know who gave him the weapons because the person was disguised. I believe him. But what do I do with him? His _i'akaa_ had far too many weapons to be allowed to walk free."

"We won't arrest him for you, but I wouldn't object to somebody doing that," Moyek replied.

Daru nodded. He called out in Okutushu, then explained to us, "They'll take him to the police or Hssak friends." A Mibir and two Zabrak, one with the staff and the other with a blaster, grabbed the Hssak's arms.

The other Hssak fled. Daru and eight others stood in front of us.

Four were Mibir, including Kerai, one my size and one taller than Tiku Lasir. There was one brown-skinned Human boy. There were two Zabrak besides Daru, a girl and a boy. The last of them was of a species that I had seen a few members of in the palace. In this context, though, I knew it must be a Shinsayama, the fourth species of Okutu. It had wide, flat feet, huge hands, large eyes, larger ears, and thick skin that, for the ones in the palace, was gray-green. I don't think it belonged in Kebro.

Daru introduced us, I think, in Okutushu. I was beginning to think that I needed to learn the language. He then turned to us. "This is my group, minus six. Three left right now, two are injured, and one is staying at the medcenter with them." He looked proud. I guess he had a right to, with fourteen people following him. I smiled.

"This is our territory, so you'll always find us near here if you need us." He grinned. "Not all of my group understand Basic, but most do. Speak slowly and clearly to them. She carries a comlink." He pointed to Kerai. "So you can contact us."

Moyek nodded but raised her eyebrows. "Does Tiku Lasir pay you?"

"We get money for medicine from the palace and the Jedi. We have people who give us food. Everything else we need we pay for or the Jedi do."

"The palace doesn't give you money for helping?"

"No. Should it?"

"Most would want it."

"We want to help," he told us firmly. "What else would we do? Our parents are all dead, but Kebro is our home. We won't leave it like this. We'll help."

* * *

When we got back to our rooms, I found a message for me from Fang. A _long_ message, too, which seemed strange. Fang doesn't talk much. He's not shy. He's just careful with his words, which only makes him seem more royal than he does, anyway, with his height and eternally somber expression. This message was written, not spoken. It was more words than Fang would say at once if you paid him.

_I don't like what I saw today. When Master Sual and I first came here, there was only one other pair of Jedi in this part of the city and one in the northwest section. Now…_

_You know. You can see it. It really bothers me that someone tried to kill you. Jiimo has told me that in his part of the city, Jedi are often attacked. I have never known that to happen here until the past few weeks. The people of Okutu respected the Jedi. They are losing that virtue. We think this new development was the reason that you and your master were sent here. I don't know what to think anymore about the reasons for the fighting. Things seem to be changing._

_Never imagine that the people still in these parts of the city are innocent. They made the choice to stay for a reason. Nobody here is a victim anymore unless they are a child and weren't allowed to make their own decisions. The rest know what they are doing._

_On another subject, how is Zefel? I can tell you that Jiimo is fine. His master is protecting him as well as possible. I have spoken some to Zefel, but I think that she is trying to disguise herself for me. Is she really all right?_

_Welcome to Kebro. Please be careful, and stay alert. We need your help._

_May the Force be with you._

I saved the message on my datapad. Who knew when I would hear so much from Fang again?

I thought that Fang was uncomfortable to be asking about Zefel. He tried to disguise it by telling me that Jiimo was "fine". Of course Jiimo was fine. If he ever isn't fine, I only hear about it much later in the safety of the Temple with far too much humor added. The only thing Jiimo has ever suffered from was Dorn's death, since Dorn was his best friend. Otherwise, he does better than Fang or I or especially Zefel.

Other than that part, Fang's message was very adult and wise. That's what his job was back when there were five of us. Dorn's was to come up with wild ideas, Jiimo's to make them work, Zefel's to be sweet to everyone, and mine to be better than the rest of them at everything.

Not really. We all had something to be good at except Dorn, who was just amusing, and didn't even mean to be.

Fang, though, was always wiser and more mature than the rest of us. That's probably because he was the oldest, almost a year older than I, the youngest. He always knew what we should do, whether he shared the knowledge or not.

I would have called Zefel then, but she would have been working at the time. I hoped she was, anyway. She sometimes got out of it.

I wrote back to Fang.

_Thanks for all the advice. I'm worried about the city, too, really worried. Zefel is _not_ fine. She does nothing but patrol Coruscant with her master, meditate, and predict death and destruction. I don't know what to do for her. She's convinced that the Jedi will all be killed. I'm really worried about her._

_You be careful, too, but I guess you always are._

_May the Force be with you._

I sent it and went to the archives. Along with my futile search for hints of what was happening, I looked up some words in Okutushu. The good part is that it's a mix of Basic, some Zabrak language, and Hssak, so it's not too strange to me. The bad part is that I didn't have time to learn it between work and sleeping. I would do my best, though.

When I got back to my room, as the Force would have it, Zefel had sent me a note. A doom-predicting note.

_I wish you were home. You and Fang both. I'm afraid I'll never see either of you again._


	8. Chapter 8

**8**

* * *

The next day's work wasn't too bad, nor the one after that. There were hardly any bombs over the next few days. We got used to not getting enough rest, though visiting the archives looked less appealing very quickly. I stopped minding the rain _quite_ so much. We caught a glimpse of Fang once or twice. I saw Daru and some of his followers at least once a day. Chisu Lasir became a familiar sight, even comforting, since we only saw him once we were safe.

We had been on the planet eight days when a bomb shattered windows above us from blocks away. Once the red dust settled enough for us to breathe, we ran to the scene.

A building had been blown apart, and several near it were on fire. Droids and sentient firefighters had gotten there already, as had Fang and Master Sual. Once again, we worked to control crowds and stop fights as they began.

The day was heavy with moisture, so it was no surprise, though a disappointment, when it started to pour. The rain did what we could not: it broke up the crowds. Everyone ran. _We_ had to stay outside and help the emergency workers.

"Why couldn't the storm have come when we were doing normal work?" I complained to Moyek.

"The Force has its reasons," she replied. "Or doesn't, as the case may be, but it doesn't actually matter. Do your work."

By the time we had cleared everything up, we were so soaked with the scarlet rain that I didn't see much point in finding shelter, but the two masters thought it would be a good idea.

Moyek chose an abandoned building down the road with its door stuck half open. However, we had hardly gotten inside when Moyek whispered, "This was a bad choice."

My eyes adjusted to the dimmer light, and I had to agree. The building was unbelievable, and not in any good way.

In one glance, I could see about thirty bodies.

I closed my eyes.

"Is it like this everywhere?" Moyek whispered.

"We don't go into many buildings that aren't being used by anyone," Master Sual replied. "But I would say yes. We've been here six months, and I would guess that this building would have been empty for most of that time, and obviously not closed up, like most of them. No one cleans up around here."

"That's sick," I whispered.

"Akite, you've been studying the archives," Moyek said as she looked around the room. "Do they say anything about how many people die?"

"They have no idea. They estimate the number of fights and explosions, but they don't really see deaths except in the big ones."

"Then they could gain the wrong impression," Moyek said. "Look. Look how many are Hssak. And there's a Shinsayama, for the Force's sake. And Zabrak and Humans. Almost none are Mibir."

From what I could see, she was right. Of course, we couldn't really tell with the older ones.

I shuddered. This was awful.

We moved out of the building. The next one had a working door, and there were no bodies inside. That was a huge relief. We settled down to wait for the storm to exhaust itself.

Moyek started meditating. She probably would have liked me to meditate, too, but I didn't want to.

"I don't like this planet," I whispered to Fang. "Everyone's killing _everyone_ else. They're all insane. And the red sand everywhere is driving me crazy." I was already drying out enough to feel blood-dust caked all over me.

"I know," was all he said. I wished he talked more. I could have used somebody to talk to me besides Moyek.

"Zefel thinks we're going to die here," I told him. "Fang, do you think Zefel really sees the future when she meditates?"

"The masters think so."

"Do they really." I shuddered. "Is _all_ of it true, then? About the Jedi being destroyed and everything?"

"She may be misreading it," Fang reminded me. "Many do. The masters think the prophecy of the Chosen One itself may have been misread, and Zefel is young and inexperienced."

I nodded, glad that he had really said something. "Moyek thinks that could be it. And I hope the Chosen One prophecy _was_ misread. I don't like Anakin Skywalker at all."

Fang raised his eyebrows.

"Okay, so I've hardly met him, but I've heard all sorts of things about him, and I don't think he knows what balance _is_. He won't bring it to the Force. And I hope Zefel is just as wrong."

Fang shrugged. "She may be famous one day. If her ideas are actually a long-term prophecy, and the Jedi survive for her lifetime, she could have a chance to be a great prophet. We could tell people how afraid we were and laugh."

Zefel, Jiimo, and I used to speculate like that when we were younglings. Fang rarely did because it takes too much talking. It was nice to hear him do it.

"Just as long as she isn't entirely right," I yawned. I did my best to shut out the storm and relax for meditation.

But the bloodrain poured down.

* * *

**Reviews, reviews! From someone besides Melannen, please. (Not that I don't appreciate it, but reviews from strangers are more flattering than ones from friends.)**

**After this, school will start, and I should be posting regularly on Fridays. :)  
**


	9. Chapter 9

**Sorry! My life took a chaotic turn in the last month, but (fingers crossed and silent prayer to the Force) it's better now. I just never got around to reading over this and posting it. I'm back in school, and I **_**will**_** post weekly after this, I hope.**

* * *

**9**

We had a long report to give Tiku Lasir. I started to fall asleep at one point, much to his amusement.

I didn't go to the archives that day. I wasn't getting anywhere as it was. The most interesting thing I had learned was that "Ara-Sini," the greeting that visitors to Sechiru and Onasik called, means "Among friends." Whenever I had heard it, though, it had been a question. Were the people of Kebro always unsure of who was a friend?

We resumed our work as usual the next day. But since seeing the building of corpses, I looked at the city differently.

No more idle dislike. There was something wrong with the city. The scarlet sand and rain was wrong. The casual killing was wrong. The abandoned buildings were all wrong. I wanted to go back to Coruscant. I understood Coruscant. But I couldn't leave this place the way it was. I had to help it somehow. I was beginning to see Daru's perspective on that.

One night, I dreamed I was a Mibir and was flying over the red city. It wasn't until I saw Tiku Lasir flying with his huge wings that I realized that I was a Zabrak and Zabrak don't fly. Naturally, I started falling then. I landed on a building top, oddly enough, with Daru. He said that Zabrak can fly, but they can't go up without help. We jumped off the building and we did, indeed, fly gracefully over the city as we floated down.

Moyek found the dream highly amusing when I told her. It was hard for me to look at Tiku Lasir and Daru with a straight face that day. I wished I could see Tiku Lasir fly but couldn't imagine Daru doing it.

I managed to tell Daru about it the next day as we took a break in the Sechiru shelter. He was there with seven of his _itaka_. I hardly ever saw all of his people at once. There was always someone either injured or busy elsewhere. Sechiru was their home, though.

"Didn't you know?" he teased me. "Zabrak _can_ fly. All the time… in their dreams." He leaned against the wall and stretched out his legs. "It's hard not to dream about being a Mibir when more than a third of the people you know are. I probably know more Mibir than Zabrak."

"Aren't Hssak really the majority on Okutu?" I asked. "But Mibir seem to be the majority here, and you don't have any Hssak in your group."

Daru nodded. "Hssak, then Mibir, then Shinsayama, then Zabrak, but you don't see that precise order in most places. In the real capital, Shinsayama and Zabrak dominate and there are very few Mibir. I don't have any Hssak because they work better in their own groups. You've seen the group of teenage Hssak."

There was one working for us, run by an adult. They lived at the Onasik shelter. They were _fierce_.

"Daru," I asked sleepily. "Why d'you speak Basic so well? You're better than Tiku Lasir."

"Am I really?" He sat up straight and looked excited.

"Yeah. You speak like it's your only language. He speaks like he's being really careful."

"I really speak better than he does?" Daru and his _itaka_ loved Chisu Lasir, though none had met him. "I know why, probably. Most schools use Okutushu to teach and have one class in Basic. My school taught in Basic, and after school, I would stay at a Human neighbor's apartment until my parents came home. She and her kids spoke Basic."

I nodded. That was probably why he wasn't so racist, too.

We heard the hisses that were the Hssak version of "Ara-Sini" above. Daru, Moyek, I, and several others jumped up.

"Aya!" Daru called in response, the Okutushu word for "yes" or "it's true."

Our rest was over. We had to work. But how I loved those breaks at Sechiru.

* * *

We must have gone a week without running into Fang or Master Sual. We met at least one pair of Jedi every day, but somehow we didn't find Fang.

It was drizzling bloodrain when we did. We were wandering, wondering if it was enough rain to discourage fights. Hssak didn't mind water as much as Mibir did, and not everyone can get to a _clean_ shelter easily. Fang and Master Sual were doing the same thing.

We didn't have much to say. We were all tired.

Then, through the bloodrain, something strange started.

I felt it or I heard it. I don't know which. It seemed to waver between audible and not-quite-audible. It slid at the edge of my consciousness, grating in my head, too high to be heard but to loud not to be sensed.

I winced and turned my head, rubbing my ears. Fang winced, too, and Master Sual turned to a building on the side of the street.

"What is it, Akite?" Moyek asked me.

"I don't know," I whimpered.

"What do you hear?"

"I can't even tell if I hear it!"

"A Hssak is screaming," Fang said shortly. "Most adult Zabrak and Humans can't hear it, and Shinsayama can't even as children. It's too high."

The noise disappeared for a moment and I sighed in relief. Master Sual was trying to open a locked door on the building. I hurried over to help.

"I'm too old. Ouch," Moyek said. She's pretty young, and most Jedi don't complain about age, but Moyek does anything that Jedi don't do because, in her own words, "They don't do it." She drives several masters crazy with that.

"Do you hear it?" I asked Fang as we slid the door open.

"Mibir, Togruta, Twi'lek, and Paifei hear it easily," he replied.

"Paifei?" I echoed. "What are they?"

He looked at me from his nearly two meters with his gold eyes. "Me," he said.

* * *

We'd always suspected that Fang wasn't human. Finally, it was confirmed. It turned out that when he first arrived on Okutu, Tiku Lasir had immediately asked him if he was a Paifei, and when Fang said that he didn't know, the Tiku told him that he must be.

I didn't hear much about the species from Fang, since what we found in the building distracted us, but I looked it up in the palace. The normal holonets didn't have nearly as much information as the palace archives. In fact, the rest of the galaxy seemed to have hardly heard of them.

Paifei are a near-Human species from the planet of Saang. They average at two meters and have skin in shades of gold. They mostly keep to themselves, but a group settled on the planet Mibi, where Humans had already come. There, they created a new species from Paifei and a large flying mammal of Mibi with a bit of Human added in. And then, the inhabitants of Mibi had cast their creations away. I was amazed that the Mibir could stand Fang at all, but he said that they tended to respect him more than other Jedi. Moyek says that you have to love your family no matter what. I asked how she knew something like that, since Jedi don't have family. "The Jedi _are_ a family," she explained.

* * *

Back to the screaming Hssak – something I'll never forget and never like to think back on. We followed the sound and the Force-feelings of agony down to a basement that was unnervingly like the Sechiru shelter.

I won't share what the young Hssak looked like. Three Mibir had been torturing them. They were only younglings. Clan-age at the Temple, probably. Like the innocent little younglings I played with every afternoon when I was waiting for a master after Oreti died.

But they weren't in a safe place like the Temple.

Moyek and I arrested the Mibir, and Fang and Master Sual tried to help the Hssak. I later heard that one of the four survived. Maybe Jedi don't take revenge, but I knew then that I had to find some way to stop this in the name of the young Hssak.

But violence seemed as integral to Okutu as rain – bloodrain, as it was – and you can't stop rain from falling from the sky without destroying a planet as thoroughly as Coruscant was destroyed.


	10. Chapter 10

**10**

* * *

I think Daru planned to be at Sechiru whenever we were. I don't know how he did it, but he was always there with about half of his _itaka_.

The day after we found the little Hssak, I met Daru with a heart full of questions. I knew so little about this planet. Maybe its history was what I should have been studying in the archives.

I had spoken to Zefel the evening before. She had been in a good mood for a change, so we talked a lot. I didn't tell her about the Hssak – she would have had a fit – but I did tell her about Fang's species. She didn't seem happy about that. I had thought that it was just nice to know what species Fang was. It wasn't as if we had really thought he was human, had we?

But I didn't think about that then. It wasn't important.

"Daru, do you know what Paifei are?" I asked. We were leaning against the wall in Sechiru and just relaxing. Kerai, who Daru called his best friend, was off somewhere, so we had license to talk alone.

"Of course. Everyone here does."

"I didn't until yesterday."

He turned to me with surprise. "But your friend Fang –"

"That's how I found out. What do you think of them?"

"I dunno. I've only ever met Fang, and he doesn't come here much. Or talk much. You get really funny answers from Mibir. Some love Paifei, some hate them some won't say a word on the subject, and some just seem to think they're wingless Mibir and there's nothing to discuss. I guess that's how I feel."

"Huh." I didn't know whether any of this was important, so I changed the subject to something easier. "Daru, did you give this place to the Jedi?"

"No!" He laughed. "Kids don't have authority like that. Neither do adults actually – it's probably illegal for us to be here – but no one's going to enforce that law. No, me and my _itaka_ were staying in an apartment where one of us lived, but we were kicked out, and we were homeless for a while. We met Master Tirem, and we decided to join him, and he showed us this place. It was good."

"Why do you do everything you do for us? Is it for this place and food? Is that enough for you to risk your lives for us?"

"Okay, first, I do it for the city, not the Jedi," he said, sitting up straight. "But, Akite, would I be safe if I weren't doing anything? There would be more danger in the city, wouldn't there? Besides, you know, what _would_ I be doing? I lost my family, and it's hard enough to find people to adopt the little orphans without trying to give the older ones homes, too."

I thought about the little Hssak. I didn't know yet that three of them had died, so I was still hoping.

"There's no school running in this part of the city. Nobody to go home to. Few places to spend money and fewer to earn it. And it's not like the better parts of the city _like_ refugees, especially teenagers. What _should_ I be doing? At least I have a home and food and an _itaka_ here."

He was waiting for an answer. I nodded. "Yeah – you're right."

"Besides," he added, leaning against the wall again. "I like running an _itaka_. It's nice to be in charge of things and respected."

He gave me a calculating look out of his black eyes. "You probably never feel this way, since you're a Jedi and everything, but I used to think nobody respected me enough. You know, I spoke Basic before most of my class, I was smart, and I always noticed things and came up with answers everyone else overlooked, and they treated me like another kid. I was so frustrated. At least when people look at _you_, they see a Jedi."

"Not everyone," I said. "When I was first a padawan, I wasn't even twelve years old yet, and everyone would look at me like they couldn't believe I was a Jedi. And I wanted to look at the archives when I came here, but I had to get Tiku Lasir's permission because I'm only a kid. It's not so easy."

There was a lot more I could have said. When I was a youngling in the Temple, _I_ thought that nobody appreciated my skills. I was good at everything. I thought I should be recognized for that, but the masters knew I would get a deadly case of pride if they did. Thank the Force I had learned by the time I became a padawan. I would have gotten some nasty surprises.

"Really? I never would have thought… I guess I'm in good company." He grinned. He has a great smile, and I had to give one back. "I like doing this, though. It feels good to be listened to. And it's so great to be free, you know, not having to answer to adults."

I started wondering then. How many people liked the freedom of not answering to anyone? A bad reason to be causing such misery in Kebro, but there are heartless people in the galaxy. Surely this motivated a few.

I was starting to suspect that there wasn't a clear answer to the problem in Kebro, but I wasn't ready to admit that. It would mean that there was no clean, sure way to end this, and I didn't want that to be true.

* * *

Unfortunately, that was the last time we really relaxed in Sechiru. That evening, someone threw two small grenades through the broken windows. There were three _itaka_ inside at the time, but they were in the basement, so nobody was badly hurt.

Still, it made us nervous. There had been halfhearted attacks before, but this one was clearly malice against the Jedi. Somebody had painted – don't ask me where they got the paint – the only graffiti I ever saw in Kebro across the front of the building. The message was something about Jedi and Jedi-helpers that would have made a good number of the Masters back home have heart attacks if we had told them about it. (They wouldn't have been too happy to find out that I only knew what it meant because Moyek had explained it to me a year earlier, either.) We were losing what respect we had had, and I knew that only death could come out of that.

**Reviews would be greatly appreciated.**


	11. Chapter 11

**11**

* * *

**Wow. It feels like I updated a couple of days ago. My sense of time is getting so thrown off – just from growing up, I think. I'm not used to the idea that time goes faster now that I'm seventeen than it did when I was twelve or something.**

**It's a very short chapter, but you'll see that it had to end where it does.**

* * *

The creeping thought that there was no simple solution to the problems on Okutu was, to my relief, quieted by Chisu Lasir. When we reported to him a few days later, he had some news for us. He had heard reports from several sources that Mibir, especially in the northwest city, were talking about someone who called him- or herself Taksayan. That meant Fireflight in Okutushu, and it was the name of a sort of imaginary hero for the Mibir, a spirit of the species. Tiku Lasir thought that this name had been circulating for some time, but nobody had realized that it was a real person until recently.

This was interesting. Somebody had decided to take on the persona of a Mibir dream and was becoming known. Who was this person? Where could we find him or her? Was this the key?

I meditated for a long time on that, but I didn't get anywhere.

Fireflight. Hmm.

We asked Daru and our other helpers if they had heard of Taksayan. Most laughed and tried to tell us that he was an element of literature and tall tales. Nobody had any information for us.

Daru said that this wasn't the way to get anything better. He said it would waste our time and energy, which we didn't have enough of in the first place. I wasn't about to give up, though. This was what I wanted to find.

Daru gave me a concerned look when he thought I wouldn't notice. He had never worried about me before, so I didn't think I should like it, but it was sweet of him.

News started coming in soon enough. It seemed that once we knew what to look for, Taksayan was everywhere. There was no way to trace him, but he was there. He hated Jedi. He hated Tiku Lasir, the High Governor, and the rest of the government because they treated all species equally. According to some people, he had an _itaka_ with a name, which is unusual for an _itaka_. That's more like a Coruscant gang, actually, and Taksayan did not like Coruscant. It was probably just for intimidation. Their name was _Samudri_. Blood-dust.

Well, that was everywhere, and so were they.

I was woken up one morning by a loud explosion. We all ran out into the hallway. A Hssak walked through the hallway, hissing what I guess were comforting words in its language. At any rate, most people returned to their rooms.

The Hssak beckoned to us and Iru Tokan, the only people around who worked in the streets. Iru Tokan was an unusually disagreeable Mibir who had somehow gotten to live in the palace, one of the only non-Jedi Kebro peacekeepers who did. He had apparently known – perhaps been friends with – Tiku Lasir before this had started. He obviously disliked Zabrak – he gave us angry looks whenever we crossed paths at the palace. He was kind enough to ignore us that morning.

We followed the Hssak to Tiku Lasir, who, of course, was wide awake – I'm convinced that he never slept the entire time we were in Kebro. His face was drawn, and he tapped his fingers against his leg, more worried than I had ever seen him.

"This time, it _was_ aimed at us," he said. "In fact, it was on the grounds. Nobody was killed or seriously injured, but as this is possible, we must be more cautious in the future.

That started the longest day of my life except, perhaps, Geonosis.


	12. Chapter 12

**12**

* * *

**Aargh… I meant to post this last night. I had it all ready and everything… and forgot about it!!**

* * *

Tiku Lasir decided that the shelters should be stocked with more food and, if everyone could keep themselves from wasting it, extra water. Moyek and I, being available, were in charge of getting the food there safely, which took hours, since we used vehicles but couldn't go too quickly in case of traps. Still, it wasn't much worse that what we had been doing. We walked next to the vehicles most of the way and broke up fights. We were dusty, hot, and tired by the time we sat down in Onasik to eat some of the food we had protected

Then, out again with our senses alert for explosives. We were supposed to hand anyone carrying one to the military or police. I was sure that we were going to regret it. I didn't trust the militia. They're just normal people. And we knew too well what normal people were doing – in Kebro and everywhere.

Finally, we met Daru with nine of his _itaka_ in time to eat again. "You should be out when we're in," Moyek snapped at Daru as she rationed out the food. "We shouldn't all rest at once."

"Sorry, Master," he said humbly.

As we ate, Kerai told us in broken Basic that they had been looking around the building and the ones around it, and they had been finding good things. Electronics, weapons, preserved foods… Master Tirem had given them permission to take food, and they were going to go collecting, but he wasn't sure about the rest.

Moyek sighed and shrugged at me. "I don't know – the owners may be dead, or they may have had to leave quickly or not realized that they would be gone so long. It doesn't seem quite right."

That was why they hadn't gone exploring before, they said. But it had been so long.

We heard a call from above. "Ara-Sini!"

"Aya!" we all replied.

It was a couple of Zabrak from an adult _itaka_. They gave Daru a disdainful look. They thought his people were too young to be fighting, so I guess leading an _itaka_ never did fulfill Daru's hopes of respect. They murmured to Moyek. She glanced at me, to them, and back to me.

"Akite, would you stay here? If they want to go foraging, you can go with them. Make sure it really was preserved properly. And maybe you can take weapons if you really, really want them. That seems fair enough."

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"Yes, I'm sure. I don't think this is something you'll want to see. It's bad enough that you saw the Hssak and that I have to do this."

I nodded, wincing inside. This had to be bad. "May the Force be with you."

"You, too." She dashed up the stairs.

"What was that about?" Daru asked me as we got up. He chose Kerai and a small Zabrak boy to come with us, leaving the biggest Mibir in charge.

"Well, first, somebody's been torturing someone else," I began, speaking slowly for the benefit of the other two. "I think the victims were Zabrak, so it would be worse for me to see. Probably they weren't children, though. There were probably a lot of people involved. Actually, I think this must be a common practice in the place they found, because it has to be serious enough to get a Jedi involved. And my last guess is that the victims were women and the torturers weren't. Moyek doesn't like men much. There are specific males that she likes, but she doesn't trust them as a group. She probably didn't want me to see what she would do much more than she wanted me to see the place."

"Wow," said Kerai.

"How can you tell all that?" Daru asked.

"Well, I'm just guessing, but I know Moyek."

We climbed the back stairs, which were dark and close-walled. I could tell Kerai was getting edgy. I didn't blame her. She was free to fly most of the time, and this could make even a Jedi claustrophobic.

We went up to the third floor before coming out. The hallway was dark, too, but some of the doors were open, letting in some light.

"The locks needed electricity, too," he commented. "Come look at _this_."

There were rows and rows of preserved food. Kerai carried several cloth bags, and they began to fill them.

"Don't take everything," I warned. "The owners might come back some day."

"I can't imagine who would hoard all this food and why they would leave it unless they're dead," Daru pointed out.

I shuddered.

"And they're lucky nobody looted the building."

"Nobody _else_."

He shrugged. "We'll be careful what we choose." He added something to the other two, probably a reminder to do that.

We went up to the next floor after that room, and his face lit up.

"Look at this," he said, going to one of the first rooms. He slid a metal sword out of a sheath. His face glowed as he held it. "It's gorgeous, isn't it?" he whispered. "A Mibir blade. And well kept-up, strong, and sharp."

His face made me smile, though my lightsaber was better than any deadblade.

"They left it. We can take it, right?"

He looked so happy that I nodded. Moyek said we could if we really wanted something, and he really wanted it.

"Thank you, Akite!" he sighed. There was a belt for the sheath to go on, and he pulled it around him, though it was nearly too big.

I've never understood deadmetal blades. They need a separate sheath to keep them from harming anything, which is ridiculously wasteful, and they're heavy to carry. I was glad that we had moved past them. Still, Daru loved this one, so I knew it must have been good.

* * *

They had already decided which rooms were important. They had planned everything out.

Around the eighth floor, I think, the Mibir girl whispered something to Daru and grinned. He nodded back with a smile.

"Follow me, Akite," he said. "They don't need us."

"Where?" I asked as we headed down the hall.

"I'll show you something."

We went to the staircase, then up and up and up. Back and forth, up that blasted staircase.

Finally, we reached the top, and Daru opened a door to the light. "Come on," he urged me.

I went out, kicking up a heavy layer of blood-dust. I coughed and looked around.

We were on the roof. It was flat, so the dust collected. There were some footprints near the door, but most of the sand was undisturbed.

"Remember that dream you had?" Daru asked as he walked away from the door.

"When I was flying and landed on a roof with you?" I asked, walking with him.

"And then we flew together," he said. "I wish we could do that. Just fly away and… Well, we can't fly, but I wanted to bring you up here."

We came to the edge of the roof and looked out. Most of the buildings were the same size as ours, so we couldn't see too far, but we could see quite a bit. Just a step, just a little jump over that little barrier there, and we'd be flying, like in my dream.

"I like being with you," Daru said.

I smiled at him. "Thanks. I like it, too. Now, all that's missing is wings."

He leaned towards me, and suddenly, we had that, too, because he pressed his mouth to mine, and I kissed him back.

* * *

I pushed Daru away. I took a step back, and my heel hit the barrier on the edge of the roof.

"No, Daru, I can't!"

His face was heartbreakingly confused and hurt.

"No, you don't understand," I gasped. "I _can't_. I'm – I'm a Jedi! I can't. I'm not allowed. Jedi aren't allowed to – to – to love. Ever. It's against the rules. I just can't!" My heel hit the barrier again. My eyes stung. I looked at the red, dusty roof instead of his face.

"Why?" he asked dully.

"I don't know," I admitted. "But it's one of the strictest rules. It's not –" I paused, realizing what I was about to say, then said it, anyway. "It's not that I don't want to."

I was definitely going to cry. Falling in love was Zefel's job. She did it. Not me. Not Akite.

"Don't stand so close to the edge," he warned me, his voice still toneless.

I dared to look up. His face was closed to emotion. Tears filled my eyes.

He took my arm and led me to the door. "I love you," he said. "I guess it always fades, but I can't believe it will."

I rubbed my eyes, but that only put more sand in them. "I love you, too," I whispered. "There's nothing I can do."

"I know."

I stepped into the darkness of the stairwell, and he followed me, closing the door.

In the blackness, he spoke again. "I've never known a girl like you. Not even Kerai. She still puts herself below me. But you – I can admit that you're above me and not feel that it's unfair." These were things he couldn't say to my face, but in the darkness, they were acceptable. "I'm afraid I'll never find another."

"I guess that's how love should feel," I said. "Not that I know – or ever will…"

"Don't cry, Akite," he said anxiously. "I couldn't stand to hear you. Please don't cry."

I stopped at the first landing from the top. A faint bit of light came through the open door from some place down the hall, but not enough to see by.

He stopped, too. "What is it?"

I took his arm and pulled him close to me. "Just once," I whispered.

Kissing was something that could be done, just once, in the darkness.


	13. Chapter 13

**13**

Daru whispered in Okutushu to Kerai. I didn't look at them. I felt like a traitor to everyone – Daru for refusing and the Jedi for accepting even for a few moments.

Moyek was waiting for us. With one glance, her eyes, haunted by something I had not experienced with her, took in the bags of food, Daru's new sword, and my face.

I felt like I was drowning in irony. She had sent me with Daru to protect me from seeing something she deemed me to young for. But in leaving me behind, she had allowed me to age in another way. And now we both had experienced something great and terrible that we couldn't share.

I wonder what would have happened if she had taken me with her.

"Let's go, Akite," she said.

I glanced over my shoulder at Daru as I followed Moyek up to the stairs back to the world, where Zabrak Jedi never fly.

"I think we're going to have to talk when we get back to the palace," Moyek said as we left. "But let's clear a few things up now. I am glad you didn't see what I saw – oh, I am very glad. Now, what did you and Daru do?"

"We went through the rooms and collected food. And that sword. He really wanted it."

"What else? Let's be honest, Akite. I don't want to be thinking this if it isn't true, and I want you to tell me if it is."

"We went to the roof. Me and Daru."

"Alone."

"Yes."

"What did you tell him?'

"The truth. Jedi can't love."

"Oh, they can. And do. And get into trouble for it, with the Council and the galaxy. Don't, Akite. Tell me you won't."

"I told him no. I love him, I do, but I'll try to forget."

"I'm sure it isn't easy."

"Have you ever…"

"I guess we all have, once, but once you've seen what I've seen, and today was no exception, you wouldn't like men much. Not that I ever did. Oh, I trust Daru and Tiku Lasir and most male Jedi, but in general… _Hey!_"

She shouted the last word at a Hssak that was running on all fours towards us. A young Mibir, small enough to fly between the buildings, was giving him a good race. It screamed something about Taksayan.

So it began again. _No,_ I thought. _It never ends._

* * *

We rested at the shelter at Onasik. I don't think it would have mattered if we had gone to Sechiru. I knew then why Daru had made a habit of appearing when we went there, and if I had been him, I would have used that skill to stay far away from us that day.

I wondered how he felt. He had taken the news well, I thought. Most people would have been heartbroken. I wondered if he was still, somehow, hoping I would change my mind. Maybe he still hadn't quite realized what it all meant. I did, and I couldn't stand it.

It occurred to me that I _did_ have a choice. I could leave the Order. And I actually wondered if it meant I didn't love Daru enough if I wasn't willing to do that for him. But it meant leaving everything and everyone I had ever known except for the people on Okutushu. And I knew I couldn't stand living there. Besides, the Jedi Order was my life. I hadn't known anything else – not since I was four years old, and I couldn't remember that far back. Still, it felt like I should be willing to sacrifice for my love.

But that?

And in these times?

_No,_ I told myself. _You made the right choice._

_If only it could feel right._

"Akite!" Moyek shouted at me once, after I had been thinking about this so much that I was nearly blown up by a Mibir who swore by Taksayan. We had realized that we heard a lot about the Mibir legend but hadn't understood that we had been hearing a name, not a word. "Akite, _this_ is why Jedi aren't supposed to love. You're going to get yourself killed, and me, too."

"Moyek, I'm sorry, really sor –"

"I don't need sorry, I need change."

That's the way Moyek is, but I can't help apologizing when I'm ashamed. "Yes, Master," I mumbled, looking down.

"I can take you back to the palace, but that'd waste time, and I don't want to be alone in _this_ city."

Something in her voice conveyed the same disgust and dislike for Kebro as I felt. At least it wasn't just me.

But something was changing. I had kissed Daru amidst the blood-dust on the roof. It couldn't be _all_ bad.

But most of it was. I had watched Zefel's constant agony of silent and not-so-silent love since she was eleven, and I didn't see much good in any of it. The few holodramas I've seen are ridiculous on the subject. Is there ever a happy ending without love in the galaxy's eyes? To them, then, all Jedi must be doomed. No wonder they can't sympathize with us.

"But if you keep this up, I'll be better off on my own."

Moyek's words felt like a slap. A hard slap. Apprentices are supposed to help their masters in return for mentoring. It's the worst fear of a padawan that he/she/it might actually be hurting his/her/its master.

"I'll pay better attention," I promised.

"Good."

Moyek was not in a good mood. I could feel it.

We were quite a pair that day.

Every moment, we suffered, both of us. The city was strangling us, and when we found some safety, it broke our hearts. Me and Daru. Moyek watching us. All of us seeing endless torture and bloodshed.

Every minute of every our, we had to work under the weight of hopelessness. The knowledge that our time was wasted in Kebro. That we were needed somewhere else, and that we could change things other places. How had Master Tirem and Jans survived there since the beginning of the trouble? We were dying before we had even been there for two months.

Was there any hope left in the galaxy?


	14. Chapter 14

**14**

* * *

**These few chapters – the last two and this one – are for Melannen Halfelven, who has apparently stopped reading fanfiction lately. Oh, well. That gives me more time to build my bomb shelter. I have to collect more food in case it's atomic.**

* * *

"When can we go back to the palace?" I muttered that evening. It seemed that we had been out for days. I kept thinking about Daru. And what Moyek had seen that I hadn't. And Taksayan. And whether we should just barricade the bad parts of the city and allow their residents to destroy themselves. But mostly about Daru.

"You know when," Moyek snapped. Then, she sighed and said more gently, "I know. I want to go home, too – I mean, to the palace."

Was the palace our home by then? Or becoming our home? Or had she been unconsciously saying that she wanted to be back at the Temple?

I couldn't stand to stay any longer.

We noticed, that day, that the fighting seemed to have turned on Zabrak by Mibir. Fang had told me that he felt the most hatred from Zabrak, and I, conversely, felt it from Mibir. The Hssak were an extra problem to the two species – the original owners of the planet yet very far from the other species. Mibir and Zabrak were too alike not to feel emotion for each other, and it came out in pure hatred. And, we thought, the Zabrak seemed to be losing.

Evenings were the worst time, maybe because everyone felt the weight of the day, as Moyek and I did. But evening also meant that we could rest in just a few hours.

Just a few hours, I told myself. Moyek and I were the last pair of Jedi out, but in just a few hours, we would be finished and the militia would take over to let the police and Jedi rest. Mibir don't like to fly in the dark, and Hssak need light, too. We could trust the badly trained people to keep order then.

Well, actually, we couldn't.

"What in the galaxy do you think you're doing?" Moyek shouted to a group of four Mibir in Militia uniforms.

It was pretty clear to me what they were doing. They were systematically injuring two adult and one teenage Zabrak – in plain view. They had cut the Zabrak's faces and arms where the wounds would bleed and hurt most but not necessarily kill and, if the victims did survive, scar very visibly.

When they heard Moyek, the Mibir dropped their blades and tried to run. They had been stupid enough to do what they were doing in clear sight and without a lookout – imagine if an _itaka_ of Zabrak had passed before we had – so I wasn't surprised when one tripped and went sprawling in front of us. Clumsy idiot.

Like Dorn. But Dorn had been a Jedi and hadn't ever hurt people through malice.

"Akite, get them!" Moyek shouted.

We didn't often make arrests, but these were people who were supposed to be helping the palace, not contributing to the problem. I managed to catch one before he could get off the ground and another as he was lifting off. The third got too high as I bound the other two.

Moyek had bound the clumsy one and was doing here best to stop the bleeding for the youngest Zabrak, a girl about my age. "Akite. Find police _now_. Three prisoners and three Zabrak in desperate need."

I ran. The police called the medical workers and ran with me back to Moyek and the six others. A crowd had gathered. I wondered where all these people came from as I did my best to disperse them. Was this their amusement?

I knelt by the girl. Moyek had moved on, having stopped the worst bleeding, but the girl's face was still covered with bloody agony. Her blood, I noticed, was darker than the "blood-dust" she lay in. I had never thought to directly compare it before.

Her eyes opened. They weren't any different from mine. They weren't so different – only in color, really – than the eyes of Fang or any Mibir or human. Nor was her face very different. Except for the horns and skin color, half the galaxy would look like that after some sadist had pulled knives down their cheeks and across their foreheads.

I wanted to hold her hand, but they were bloody, too. I lay a hand on her shoulder and tried to smile comfortingly. I stumbled over the Otukushu word for "safe." I wished Fang had been there.

Her eyes were full of something I had seen before, but rarely directed at me. It was admiration, almost adoration.

She made a soft noise, trying to talk without moving her lips. I leaned closer to hear.

"Araki."

_Thank you._

* * *

"That was the _second_ issue of militia torturing civilians that I've dealt with today," Moyek growled as she left. "Don't they train them? Do they _know_ that the Mibir are getting out of hand?"

"They're all civilians – at least, as much as each other," I said. The girl's eyes were still haunting me. I wondered why she had stayed. Maybe her parents – the other two might have been parents – didn't want to leave for some reason. "So the other thing – when you left me – that was the militia?"

"That's why they needed me. I had authority over the criminals." This was something I had missed in my speculations. "Well, _these_ Zabrak will recover, at least."

I winced at her implications.

Everything was falling apart. Could we trust _anybody_ but the Jedi? Well, I thought, we could trust our friends, and the Zabrak seemed to be better than the Mibir. Daru.

We heard shouts nearby – lots of them. We stopped talking and started jogging.

We heard the explosion as we were coming to the crowd, but there was barely any shock. A noisy but small explosive, hidden in a pocket to use when one was too cowardly to fight. The issue was probably something small but infuriating enough to gather a crowd.

Brandishing our lightsabers, we split the crowd. But I didn't want to be there. Something in the explosion had struck me like a punch in the stomach, and I felt like throwing up.

If I ever forget any of Kebro, what I saw in the middle of the crowd will be the last thing to go. After the Hssak younglings. After Daru and me in the dark stairwell. After the bloody-faced girl who thought I was worth thanking. This will stay with me after everything else I have ever seen has faded.

I stood beside Moyek in the crowd of onlookers and looked into the center, where dust still fell. On the other side of the circle, a Togruta – Master Sual – stood poised, one foot slightly in front of the other, his mouth slightly open, as if he, too, had pushed his way though the crowd and he, too, couldn't bear to see what was in front of him.

In the settling dust, three bodies lay: a small Mibir, its eyes still open and its broken wings not yet big enough to carry it; a large Mibir, perhaps its mother, with her enormous wings thrown wide and twisted; and a Paifei who had only ever wanted to help ease pain and would never feel it again.

Master Sual's cry of agony rose above all other sounds.

Gently, Moyek took my shoulder and turned me away.


	15. Chapter 15

**15**

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**Fourteen chapters. Ten reviews. Typical. I've never figured out what I do wrong.**

**And here I am, complaining about reviews, while Akite…**

**Selfishness is too easy.**

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I don't think we said anything as we walked back to the palace. We went straight there – no wandering, no detours, almost no lightsaber-wielding for Moyek and none for me.

Fang.

So steady. So sure. Always there when I needed him.

Fang.

In the time since Geonosis, he had almost become a better friend to me than Zefel. He was reliable. She frightened me. She had become so emotional. He knew control.

He was the perfect Jedi. He should have risen to great heights. But the war had killed him.

Killed.

Fang.

The war had killed Fang and Dorn and destroyed Zefel. What was left? How long until Jiimo and I died?

Does anyone survive war?

That was when I stopped thinking. That was when my mind shut off.

Somebody pressed the buzzer for my door. I was in a place of soft greens, blues, golds, and whites. Fang was out there in the red dust. His body was probably in a clean place by then, but he would never leave the tiny grains of blood-red sand of Kebro. Not for me.

"Akite!"

Moyek was annoyed, so I dragged myself to the door.

"I can't stay for you, Akite. I have to go out and finish my shift. We can't afford to give me time off. Everything you need is here. Take some time to meditate. You'll be fine in the end. Really. We're going to try to get Jiimo over here so you two can be together, but I don't know if that'll work out.

"Thanks," my voice said. "Thanks for bringing me home."

"Oh, we're not home yet. The palace is no home for us. Nothing is in this time of war. We aren't nearly there, and maybe never will be again in our lives. But Akite, I love you, and I know we can keep going as long as there is love in the galaxy."

I knew she wasn't speaking about the love I felt for Daru. She was talking about something very different and very powerful. It was forbidden by the Jedi Council, but it was the root of all beauty and ugliness in the galaxy.

Love.

And hate.

The same thing. The same indestructible passion.

I lay back on my bed.

Perhaps, though the masters would deny it, the Force.

Later, I don't know how much later, something else woke me out of my reverie. It was rain. Pouring rain. Red as blood.

I sat up and leaned my hands against the window and, for the whole storm, I watched the bloodrain come down and down…

* * *

I woke with my head on the windowsill and a cramp in my shoulders and neck. I stretched to relieve the pain.

But there was a deeper pain. One that would not be relieved.

_How does Master Sual feel?_ I asked myself, but it was no use. I couldn't think about another person's pain.

_Or Zefel? What will she think?_

All I felt was a deep, aching hole where my friends had once been.

I stood and looked at a chrono. I hadn't been sleeping for more than an hour, but it felt like days. Years. Lifetimes. All joy and love had fled my heart. I wasn't the person I had been before. I was an empty shell of a Zabrak.

I walked to the archives since I finally had time, but there was nothing to look for there. I didn't have the curiosity anymore. I would serve. I would continue to serve the Republic and do what Moyek asked me to, but it would be a long time before I could think again.

I walked down the halls of the palace, a ghost of a Jedi padawan.

"Akite Chairu," a voice called.

I turned. Tiku Lasir. Of course. He _would_ appear.

"You should not be alone at a time like this," the Mibir said. "Come with me."

I did want to be alone. I couldn't face other people. But he looked a bit like Fang, and Daru admired him, so I felt that I had to follow.

* * *

We walked alone. His aide was somewhere else – maybe she actually slept at night. Not impossible.

He didn't seem to know what to say. I didn't even try. This had been _his_ idea. _I_ didn't have to do anything.

We ended up in the room where we usually reported to him. It seemed to mock me. It had been important in my old life, but now, it was just an empty room.

He turned to me. "I am deeply sorry for what has happened to your friend," he said somberly.

I didn't reply. There was nothing to say.

"I regret that this occurred on my planet and in my city."

"It wasn't you," I said. Something made me add, "It was the bloodrain."

"But I am a part of the bloodrain. Every person and every thing in this city is a part of it. Every person and every thing is at fault."

He was making the bloodrain sound like the Force. If only he had been Force-sensitive. He would have made a good Jedi. He did nothing but serve his city.

But hadn't he once said that he had a wife and children who had been sent to safety in the capital city? And hadn't he had a childhood and parents? Maybe siblings, too.

My siblings were scattered across the galaxy, dead or dying. They had been my classmates and friends. Jedi.

And of my four closest siblings – Zefel, Fang, Jiimo, and Dorn – only Jiimo had really survived. Only he had been able to move on. The rest of us were dead in body or spirit. Dorn, Fang, Zefel, and I – all dead.

I sat on the ledge under the window. Out there, even in the well-kept palace grounds, the blood covered everything.

Tiku Lasir sat by me. He looked out the window. I would not look.

"I love Daru," I found myself saying. My voice was emotionless. "We've told you about Daru. But I'm a Jedi, so I'm not allowed to love – anyone."

_I love you,_ Moyek had said. _And as long as there is love…_

"That I have never understood," the Mibir said. "Surely struggling to _not_ love distracts one more than allowing one to love. Surely it is more confusing for the Jedi to not be permitted to feel as all others in the galaxy feel."

"Tell that to the Council," I said dully. _They_ would never change. Not if the survival of the Republic depended on it.

We were silent for a little while. Finally, he said, "I do support the Jedi Order. I believe that it is beneficial to the galaxy. However, I do wish that the High Council would allow the Order to adapt to the times. I wish that the Senate would change, as well. But I am only the chief of security for the second most important city in a relative insignificant and troubled planet. I cannot change the Republic. I can only hope to help my city."

That was a good philosophy, I thought.


	16. Chapter 16

**16**

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**Many, many thanks to Maiyri for reviewing!**

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Tiku Lasir and I sat in the reporting room for a while. Our silence was interrupted by a call at the door.

Tiku Lasir got up. I didn't move, and he didn't ask me to.

It was his Hssak aide and Iru Tokan. Tokan immediately shot a poisonous look and asked something in Okutushu, probably what I was doing there. Tiku Lasir responded. I only caught the word, "Jedi." Tokan said something, and Tiku Lasir translated, "He is sorry that your friend was killed."

I nodded. I think he meant it. Of course, Fang _was_ a Paifei. If it had been me –

That was a scary thought. What will the galaxy look like after I'm dead? I'll never be able to know or even imagine.

The report was done all in Okutushu that went too fast for me to catch a single word. I studied the Mibir fighter.

He was filthy, covered with blood-dust. I realized that I probably didn't look much better. I hadn't bothered to shower after I got back to the palace. Beneath the red sand, I could see a scar running down his upper arm. I wondered how he had gotten it. His wings trailed tiredly on the floor. Every so often, he would straighten up and lift them, but mostly, they sagged.

He left after a while. The Hssak asked Tiku Lasir something in her language, and he responded in his. She turned to me, flicked her tail in a Hssak smile, and said, "Good 'uck, Akite."

I tried to smile back, but it wouldn't come. "Thanks."

Tiku Lasir sat by me again. "Tokan is not fond of Zabrak," he told me.

"I can tell.

"Many years ago, a Zabrak killed his parents and brothers. One of his brothers also killed the Zabrak before he died. The Zabrak tried to kill him. You see the – the scar." He indicated his right arm. I nodded. I wondered if it had been done with deadmetal, like Daru's sword.

Daru. That had been less than half a day before.

"It was the actions of one Zabrak. It was not like the fighting that has been occurring lately. He still says that he wishes to keep others from being hurt. I think that he is still very – very – very angry." He looked at me questioningly.

"Very bitter?" I offered.

He nodded. "Very bitter, yes."

I didn't blame him. But Zabrak had killed Fang. Zabrak, like me.

Like Daru.

I couldn't think about that.

I thought about flying. I had finally placed the root of my obsession with wings and flying. I had wanted to fly, myself, away from war and uncertainty and death and rules that wouldn't let me love.

I had always wanted to love.

"What do you think about?" asked Tiku Lasir, smiling.

"I always wanted to see your wings. I know it's stupid, but I have. I love seeing Mibir fly, and I always wanted… I'm sorry."

A look of surprise and puzzlement had crossed his face. "No, it is all right," he assured me. "It is just that, usually, only children – but, of course, you have not lived on Okutu." He stood, faced, me, and began to undo the clasp on his blue robe. "The cloak only goes on over the clothes," he said, as if I would think that much. "You see, I ordinarily find that only children are so concerned with wings. I will show you." He let his robe fall and turned his back to me.

Under his green robe, he was dressed like any Mibir on the street, except that his clothes were dustless. He wore black leggings and a tan shirt with strings instead of a back to make room for his wings.

But his wings.

Instead of powerful ones that reached the floor and dragged when relaxed, his wings were crumpled and didn't even reach his waist.

"Oh," I whispered finally. This Mibir, so proud and strong, was missing the defining factor of his species, the part I had always admired.

He sat next to me, rolled up the robe, and put it on his other side on the bench.

"I'm sorry," I whispered.

"There is nothing to be sorry for," he said. "You wish to know what has happened."

I nodded.

"I believe that I told you once that children once competed in their neighborhoods and that I was very good at racing."

I nodded.

"Every person I knew told me that I should become an athlete. I believed it. I claimed that I would. I believed that I would become one of the best on Okutu."

I squeezed my eyes shut. I could see this, and I could feel his pain as he realized that his dream would never come true.

"When I was ten years old, I was playing with the other children, and there was an accident. The accident was in part the fault of some Zabrak, in part the fault of a Hssak, and in part my fault. So, you see, it was the fault of nobody."

I nodded and opened my eyes. I understood.

He lay his hand over mine. "Mibir did not evolve. They were created by mortals. There are flaws in the creation. There are ways that wings break that will be impossible to correct. We knew that I would never be able to fly after that. My parents and my teachers and my friends wondered what I would be able to do in my life. They believed that I would not be able to find a new direction. There are many Mibir without the ability to fly, but I had so long thought to be an athlete. But I found something. I chose to enter politics."

He smiled, and I saw the sadness that lurked in all his smiles and made them beautiful. "I received the fame I had wished for," he said. "I have done good things for my planet. I am happy."

We heard the buzzer on the door again. He stood and swung his robe over his shoulders, hiding the wings that had not grown since he was ten.

Tiku Chisu Lasir, after all this time, had turned out to not be able to fly.

And he was happy.

How?


	17. Chapter 17

**18**

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I didn't post yesterday because my family went to Disney World. We can get there with a two-hour drive. Jealous yet?**

**I probably should mention that I'm starting a roleplay on the forums. You can look at that if you want – go to my profile and then my forums. We need players. Pleeease?**

* * *

Moyek stood at the door with Tiku Lasir's aide, Master Sual, and Jiimo.

"Akite!" Moyek said. She indicated the Hssak. "If she hadn't found us, I would have had no idea where you were!"

I just looked at Jiimo. I was glad that Moyek had brought him. I hadn't seen him in so long, and I needed a friend.

I couldn't look at Master Sual. Through the Force, I could tell that he was suffering as much pain as the rest of us combined. He had wanted Fang as his apprentice for as long as he had actually had him. He must have had such dreams for Fang. And I know they could have all been fulfilled.

But then, _this_ happened.

And no dream would come true.

"This is Jiimo Vann," Moyek told Tiku Lasir. "I'm sure you've met once or twice."

The Mibir nodded. "It is good to see you again." The Jedi in the northwestern city almost never came to the palace. He turned to Master Sual. "I am so sorry."

Another wave of pain swept off the Togruta Jedi.

Uncomfortable, but sensing that we would not be scolded, I patted the seat by my side and told Jiimo, "Sit by me."

He came. Moyek and Master Sual began their report.

Jiimo is a Rodian, a green-skinned species that would look incredibly bizarre to a Zabrak not used to them. I was, however. They are common throughout the galaxy, like Zabrak. They are generally found in the underworld, but there are plenty of Rodian senators and Jedi. I did have to wonder what the residents of Kebro thought when they looked at Jiimo and his master, though.

"I always thought Fang would be the last to die," Jiimo whispered to me. "I can't _believe_ this."

I shook my head. I couldn't, either.

"I thought I'd be the _first_!" he added.

I looked at him in surprise. "Why?"

"Because I always get in trouble! Do you know how many times I've _almost_ died?"

I was never sure how much of Jiimo's stories to believe.

"But Dorn goes first, and –" His voice choked. Dorn had been his best friend. "I never thought he'd be a good Jedi, never a master and maybe not a knight, but not _dead_! Not so young! But I thought you and Fang would survive the war – _both_ of you. I'm not sure about Zefel, but you're both so good, I always thought you would live a long time and maybe end up on the Council someday…"

He sighed deeply. I wanted to disappear. Jedi aren't used to praise like that.

"How's Zefel?" he asked.

"I don't know," I replied shortly. I had sent her a message asking her to call me, but I couldn't bear to think about her.

"Akite, Akite…" he whispered.

I've always known that he admires me, but I suddenly realized that he put so much stock in me that he expected me to make everything better.

* * *

Moyek told Tiku Lasir that she and Master Sual would continue to work. For a while, they would be partners, allowing me to recover. I'm sure the Council wouldn't have approved, and I thought that this was more to help Master Sual than me, but I appreciated it.

Moyek took me to my room. She took Fangs clothes – his only possessions other than his lightsaber, which I had seen in Master Sual's belt – from his room and gave the room to Jiimo. Master Sual had disappeared. Jiimo's master would be fine alone for a while, we thought, so Jiimo could stay.

I finally had a shower and did my best to wash off the sand before deciding that it was a lost cause and wasted precious water.

Moyek, also cleaner, came into my room and sat on my bed. "We have to talk."

"I have to report to you," I said.

"Oh?"

"About Daru. And other things. You've missed a lot."

She nodded.

I stood and told her everything about Daru, including the kiss on the stairs. She only nodded. I told her why Iru Tokan hated Zabrak. She kept nodding. I told her about Tiku Lasir. She showed some surprise at this but nodded.

"Moyek, he's lost his _wings_, but he's _happy_. How can he stand it?"

She thought about it and finally said, "There are people who experience great tragedy and fall to pieces. There are people who survive tragedy but only by destroying something inside themselves – some sort of kindness or softness. Then, there are people who take the tragedy and accept it, ready to move on or even make something great out of it. Tiku Lasir is one of those. I think he has made a better life without wings than he would have with them."

I thought about it. "What kind of person are you?" She had lost a master and an apprentice.

"The last, I suppose. I'm here with you."

I nodded. But I asked, "Which am I?"

She opened her mouth with a smile, as if ready to label me the last, but she stopped herself and asked instead:

"Which would you have yourself become?"


	18. Chapter 18

**18**

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Happy Halloween to everybody! Remember, reviews are better than candy.  
**

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I'm not sure how I got to sleep that night, but I know I did. Getting out of bed was inexpressibly difficult. I couldn't face what was coming that day. And, somehow, I knew it was coming.

Moyek, Jiimo, and I didn't talk much at breakfast. Master Sual came late in the meal. Jiimo and I stayed for a little while before Moyek dismissed us.

Because I had hardly rested, I meditated for a while. Jiimo stayed in the room with me. I think he felt useless. Fang's death didn't hurt him as much as it did me, and Daru meant nothing at all to him. He was mostly unhappy because I was.

Moyek interrupted us. She stood in the doorway with a face that gave nothing away. That meant she was _very_ upset.

"Akite, Jiimo, I'm not going to lie to you even for a day, even if I thought that could make things better for you. And I don't. You need to hear this before I leave. It's unfair to you otherwise."

"What happened?" Jiimo asked.

I didn't ask. I didn't want to know. But I would find out, whether I wanted to or not.

Moyek indicated that we were to follow her. She took us to her room. Master Sual was sitting there with a hopeless look on his face and a comm unit in his hand. Moyek took it and set it on the table.

"We got this just a few minutes ago. Master Osirai asked us to record it for you."

Kep Osirai was Zefel's master.

Moyek flicked the comm unit on. A small, blue figure of Kep appeared. (You'd think they'd make comm units with colored pictures, or images that didn't flicker so badly.) Moyek's voice came over the recording, faint and metallic. "It's recording. Go ahead."

He audibly sighed. "It's an hour short of midnight here. We got the news about Fang this afternoon. The Council allowed us to stay home until Zefel was ready to leave. She was more upset than I have ever seen her. I'm sure she's been worse, when she just returned after the Separatists, but not while I've known her." His breath came in like a sob. He and Zefel had both been prisoners of the Separatists after Geonosis, and when they came back to the Temple afterwards and met each other, I think they saved each other. "I tried to talk to her and Master Yoda tried, but she wouldn't respond. Eventually, we had to leave her to work things out for herself, and I let her in the Room of a Thousand Fountains."

I thought about that room, all the gardens. Zefel's favorite place in the galaxy. Moyek took one of my hands and held it silently.

Kep let out another sob. "I looked for her later to see how she was doing. Just an hour or something. I couldn't find her in the Room. I finally went to her room, and – and I found her there." He rubbed a hand over his face. "There's no easy way to say this. I can only hope you've figured it out already. Zefel killed herself."

It was Jiimo who gasped. It was Jiimo who shouted denial. It was for Jiimo that Moyek stopped the recording.

I just stood there.

I had known. I had known since I saw Fang's body, I think. I had known before even Zefel did. That was why I had grieved so much. That was why I hadn't been able to think of Zefel as alive.

Master Sual's head was in his hands. Moyek hugged Jiimo. Finally, she turned the comm unit back on. "There's more," she said dully.

"I'm sorry." Kep's voice shook. There was a faint sob and a shushing sound. I later worked out that this had been Moyek quieting Master Sual. "She left a message for me." He produced another comm unit. "I'll play it for you."

"Go ahead," Moyek's voice said.

"I'm sorry."

At that, the first sound of Zefel's voice, I burst into tears. Moyek stopped the recording to hug me. I kept crying until Moyek had me sit by Master Sual so we could hear the rest. The two of us cried together.

"But I can't go on," Zefel's sweet voice continued. "None of you understand. You don't see what I see. I see that the Republic is about to break down completely. I see a galaxy with Sith, not Jedi." Her voice broke. She continued after a moment. "I see younglings being massacred with a lightsaber. A _blue_ one. Are you so _foolish_," she suddenly shouted, "as to think that the Jedi can survive a war like this? We'll be gone soon! Anyone who survives will turn to the dark side. You can't survive in a galaxy like this. It's hopeless."

She took an audibly deep breath. "I've been doing my best to keep living. There were things to live for. But I just lost one of the main ones. Fang."

She took another deep breath. And another.

Finally, she said terrible words. "I loved Fang. I know that being in love gets me into trouble. I know a Jedi shouldn't be in love. And Fang was my friend. I tried not to let anybody know. When Fang came here on a break from Okutu, we finally talked about it. He loved me, too."

"Daru…" I whispered.

"We really did love each other. We even kissed, and we liked it." She let out a shaky sob. "I love Fang. I can't live with him gone."

Why hadn't I known? Why hadn't I realized? Fang was so concerned about Zefel… well, I was too, but what if he had used his concern just as an excuse to talk about her? There had always been something. I should have thought about it. And was _that_ why Zefel had been upset that Fang wasn't human? Because, if they hadn't been Jedi, they could never have had children anyway? They somehow didn't belong together?

I felt sick. This was my fault.

Zefel's voice continued. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry to everyone who has tried to help me. I'm really sorry to Master Yoda for trying so hard on a lost cause, and to Jiimo, for being my friend and Fang's friend, and especially to Kep."

_What about me?_

"Kep – you've tried to hard to be a good master. I'm sorry that you chose me. I'm sorry I gave you hope. I'm sorry that I can't help you when you need it. Thank you for everything.

"And Akite," she whispered.

_Here it comes._ She had saved me for last for a reason, I knew. I shuddered and leaned against Master Sual.

"I'm so sorry to you. More than anyone. You've been so good to me. We've been friends for eleven years, and you've always been there. I'm sorry that I can't help you when you need it. I'm sorry that I didn't call you back after you asked me to today. I know you feel terrible now." She was crying. "Don't blame yourself. It's not your fault. None of this is. I hope that you can have more happy times before everything comes apart… I just wish I could be a good a friend as you are. Akite – I'm sorry."

She could hardly gasp out the last words, it sounded like, but she added, "To everyone – especially Jiimo and Kep and Akite – may the For – good luck."

There was one more sob before the recording abruptly ended.

I was empty. Of tears, of strength, of emotion.


	19. Chapter 19

**19**

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No reviews? How can you not review?**

**In the next chapters, the story changes. It's closer to a type I don't write often. I hope I did well enough.**

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I was flying again. I was with Jiimo and Zefel and Fang and Dorn. We were laughing, all together again, and moments away from being in deep trouble with the teachers. Again. But it didn't matter. We were innocent younglings. We didn't know war or death or bloodrain.

But, eventually, Dorn disappeared, and Jiimo faded out. Zefel, Fang, Daru, and I walked together. Two forbidden, frustrated couples.

And then, Fang and Zefel walked into the distance together. Daru and I crouched behind a building to hide. Jiimo had reappeared. It was just the three of us. Three teenagers. Three kids too young for our responsibilities.

Three broken teenagers, covered with red dust that mingled with our own blood.

I forced myself to wake up, but I was leaning against my windowsill and looking at Jiimo, who was sitting on the floor by my bed. And nothing was better than in my dreams. It was worse, really, because Daru wasn't with us.

"What if she's right?" Jiimo whispered, seeing I was awake. "What if the Jedi really _are_ going to – to – all die or turn? What if there _is_ no future?"

"There's always a future," I sighed. "We can't stop time. But a future with democracy? And freedom? And Jedi? That's going to be hard. Really hard. But we can't give up, like Zefel did."

As I said it, I knew it was true. It was difficult to admit that we couldn't give up, even when our own personal worlds had been shattered, but it was true.

"We have to keep fighting," I whispered.

"I can't," Jiimo whispered back.

We didn't look at each other. We had lost our other three friends. It was just us left.

"I'll do it for you," Jiimo said.

"And your master."

"I guess so, but you need me, and he doesn't."

"Yeah. I do." But not as much as _he_ needed _me_. "I promise that I'll keep fighting. For everyone, I guess."

Jiimo nodded. We went silent. Finally, he asked, "Who's Daru?"

So I told him. He listened, and I could feel him filing away everything he heard to weave into a story one day. That is how he handles the nightmares of the galaxy, I realized. He glorifies them in his mind and stretches them into his half-true tales. He isn't lying. He's coping. We all do that in our own ways.

Or we end up like Zefel.

I don't want to end my life like that. When I die, I want to die fighting or in peace. Preferably, both.

Like a true Jedi.

_

* * *

I probably should contact Daru,_ I thought. _He'll be avoiding the Jedi, so he won't know yet._

Of course, there was a good reason that Daru would have been avoiding the Jedi…

I sighed. Jiimo and I weren't sure what we should be doing. Moyek probably wanted us to meditate, but you can only do that for so long, especially when you're a padawan.

Calling Daru would have been so hard, but I felt like he had to know what had happened to me.

I should have watched more holodramas. I knew nothing about love except what I had seen in Zefel.

_Oh, Zefel._

That was not a good topic. I tried to shift away, but I kept running into Zefel, Fang, or Daru wherever I went.

There was one other thing that I thought about.

Tiku Lasir's wings. And Moyek saying, "Then, there are people who take the tragedy and accept it, ready to move on or even make something great out of it."

I've lived through so much tragedy. I've lost my first master and three of my four best friends. And I wondered whether I could really move on.

Really?

* * *

Jiimo and I ate lunch early so there wouldn't be so many people around – and because we were bored. But that still left us half a day to spend before Moyek and Master Sual would come back.

We went to the archives. There wasn't much that I wanted to look at, but I could show Jiimo some things.

The archives-keeper came and began to ask if Jiimo had permission to be looking at these things. I just turned to her and gave all my frustration and heartbreak in a stern glare.

She turned away.

* * *

After a couple of pointless hours, Jiimo and I left the archives to see if there was anything interesting around the palace. It was quite a big place, and I had only been to a very small percentage of the rooms in it. Of course, some were private or too important for curious Jedi padawans, but there were lots of empty ones because of the danger in the city, and most were unlocked. It was fun to pretend, for a while, that we were innocent, carefree children who could go exploring the strange building we found ourselves in whenever we wanted to. When your story isn't acceptable, it's good to escape into another.

In one of the emptier wings of the palace, we met Iru Tokan. He was clean and dressed neatly. I wondered if he had more free time than we did. He probably got to choose when he worked and when he could be in the palace. He didn't have to be doing this. We did.

He gave me a look that was half sympathetic and half disgusted. Fang was probably the only thing he liked about me.

_I wonder if he appreciates that I'm a Jedi._ Maybe he didn't like Jedi or was afraid of them, since no Mibir are Force-sensitive.

He hardly spared a glance for Jiimo. Maybe he didn't like offworlders, either.

_He doesn't like many people,_ I thought as we walked in opposite directions.

Only a moment later, Jiimo and I stumbled as a shock wave swept through the palace, accompanied by the sound of an explosion and shattering glass.

I didn't wonder for a moment what had happened. I had heard too many questions and comments about bombs being aimed at the palace.

As I regained my balance, I felt a wave of bitter-yet-powerful joy from somebody close by.

The only people around there were Jiimo and I – and Iru Tokan.

I turned to look at him. He had glanced around in worry and was jogging down the hall purposefully. To go see what had happened and help Tiku Lasir, I guessed.

But, as I watched him, I knew something.

This was not a person who would take tragedy and make anything good out of it. This was someone whose misery would harden into hatred.

This wasn't somebody who was on our side.


	20. Chapter 20

**20**

To put it in words felt strange, even wrong. I didn't tell Jiimo what I thought. I just said, "Let's go. We have to find out what happened."

Jiimo followed me, of course. Out of curiosity, I stayed well behind Iru Tokan. He probably noticed, anyway, and we ran into panicked people of various species as we got closer to the front of the palace, so he certainly couldn't do anything questionable. Not that I had exactly expected him to. He would have had to be more subtle than that if he was trying to be a spy or saboteur.

He pushed aside anyone who got in his way or tried to speak to him. Jiimo and I were more polite, but we didn't want to be stopped, either.

But the chaos only worsened. I hadn't had any idea that there were so many people in the palace. Jiimo held onto my shoulder so we wouldn't get separated. He didn't know his way around the palace.

The push and pull of a crowd in narrow halls and the fear of the people around me began to weigh on my already-strained emotions. I could feel myself tensing, struggling to continue forwards, not to scream.

"Akite!" a male voice called. I looked over the heads and saw a young male doing the same, looking for me. It was Jans, Master Tirem's apprentice. They had taken me to Sechiru and introduced me to Daru. I had hardly spoken to either of them since.

Of all the people to call to me…

Jiimo and I pushed ahead to him. Tokan had passed him already, but we were going in that direction, too.

"I was supposed to find you. This must be Jiimo, right?"

I nodded.

"Hi. I'm one of the padawans, Jans Zema. I'm supposed to be on the streets, but we came here for a break." He shrugged. "So the streets came here."

He walked faster than we could have alone. He had the presence that made people move out of the way for him. He was steady. I was relieved to find that steadiness. I needed it, in this galaxy that could not be trusted to allow anything to remain as it was. He reminded me a bit of Fang.

Iru Tokan, Master Tirem, Tiku Lasir, and the Hssak were in Tiku Lasir's reporting room. I tried to sense Tokan's emotions, but there were too many people just outside the door, and he was very good at hiding how he felt. Just that made his flash of happiness more significant.

Tiku Lasir looked harried and fearful. I had never seen him like that. He was always in control.

"It was the front-west part of the main building." I had never heard him speak like this, either, clipped and fast. It occurred to me that he had never been a part of the fighting, and it had just reached his home. He couldn't hide in the clean palace. No more. "It may have aimed at the High Governor. He is not injured, but this was his part of the palace. You must send people out of the hall. Iru, when the halls are clear, you will return to the street. Master Tirem, if you will go to the bombed site after the halls clear, we would appreciate your help. Akite, Jiimo, help to calm everybody."

I could see that talking had calmed him some. I nodded. We left the room. I was the last out, and I heard Tiku Lasir murmur something in Okutushu to his aide. He still sounded afraid. I think her response was reassuring, something I would never have admitted a Hssak could sound like when I first came to Okutu.

Master Tirem and Jans went to the left. I followed Tokan to the right, but I knew that I would not be able to keep up with him. It would be impractical. We split up at the next hallway.

It was hard to make people listen to me. Jiimo, being an unfamiliar species, could gain even less attention. Moyek – or Fang – would have done fine, but I didn't have the height, strength, or poise. I kept telling everyone to calm down, that panic could not help, that they needed to go back to wherever they had been, that _we_ would take care of things, but nobody wanted to obey a teenager.

I did get the message across, slowly, and the initial fear began to wear off. But in one intersection, I think a number of congress members and advisors had gathered in their own mob, undiluted by servants or secretaries or anyone who doesn't know how to debate.

Never try to get politicians to listen to sense.

They were blocking two hallways and in a furious, frightened argument over what to do. I shouted to them that they needed to let people walk through the halls and return to their rooms. Useless. I actually considered drawing my lightsaber, but it was too crowded, and I could hurt somebody.

"SHUT UP!"

The voice bellowed over the noise of the fear and silenced it with its hatred.

Subdued, people began to move again. Tokan passed me as he moved on and gave me a scalding look. I had never had so much disapproval, disgust, or hatred directed at me before. Jedi were conditioned never to feel like that. I leaned against the wall, trying not to show my shock and horror, but _that_ was an impossible task.

"What's wrong with him?" Jiimo whispered to me. "He's working for Lasir, too. He's helping us. Isn't he?"

I glanced down the hallway to make sure that _he _was gone before whispering, "I'm not so sure about that."

In his time away from the Temple, Jiimo had gathered a vast vocabulary of curses.


	21. Chapter 21

**21**

**

* * *

A thousand thanks to "Stephanie"! I'm so glad you like it. You really gave me encouragement. I hope you find this again to read the rest, and I hope you enjoy it.**

* * *

"So what are we going to do?" Jiimo asked. The hallways were finally quiet and empty, their normal state. We had walked so far that we could see the Hssak guards blocking the way to the bombed part of the building. Stealing a glance down the hallway, I could just see collapsed walls.

Had it been thrown at the palace? Surely it couldn't be aimed so well or thrown so far. And somebody would have seen it and tried to do something, though, with Okutu's minimal technology, I'm not sure what could have been done.

Had it been brought in? Who? What kind of bomb was it? Not that I would know anything about _any_ old-fashioned bomb. Did the carrier die with its victims? Or did it have enough time to get away before the bomb went off?

It could have been Iru Tokan. I doubted it, though. We had been very far away, and he had been coming from the wrong direction. Besides, if he had set it and was any good, he would have been with Tiku Lasir at the time of the explosion so he wouldn't even have to be asked where he had been. Maybe he had helped, but I'm sure he didn't do it.

What _had_ he been doing in that part of the palace? Had he planned to be far away from the explosion? Had he not wanted to be around people who would panic? Of course, he had been going towards the more populated part of the palace, and he had gone straight on.

_And,_ I thought, _why were _we_ there? We were playing make-believe. Try explaining that to someone!_

"Akite?"

Jiimo knew I was thinking over possibilities, not listening to him.

"What?"

"What'll we do? Can we explain why we don't trust him? The Tiku trusts him, doesn't he?"

"Uh – yeah. As far as I can tell."

"Well? Why _don't_ we trust him? His hatred? What?"

"Who are you? Jiimo doesn't talk like this. He just does things."

Jiimo snorted. "No, that's Dorn. _I_ actually make things work, remember? I just – I'm not used to sharing my thoughts with other people as I work things out."

"Oh." I had always undervalued Jiimo, I realized with a painful shock. He wasn't just a smart boy who followed me around and told good tall tales. He was a planner, like me. That was probably _why_ he followed me.

_Have I ever really tried to figure him out? I just took him for granted._

"If he _really_ is working against us, we need proof. Solid proof. The Tiku isn't going to take a hunch."

He was even being careful about names. There were dozens of Tikus but only Lasir that I knew of. Nobody passing would know what we were talking about.

Impressive. I bet _he_ watches holodramas.

"So why don't _you_ trust him?" I know it's more than the hatred."

"It's because he was happy when the bomb exploded. I felt it. And I think there might be something around him – not a shatterpoint, not so clear – something important about him."

"Huh." We walked on. "Taksayan."

I stopped. "_What?_"

"Well, I know he can't _be_ Taksayan. Taksayan is from the northwest city, or, at least, his legend started there. And I don't think he could have gotten away with it. But I bet they're connected. Somehow. He probably has connections with connections… Or maybe he knows him. We can't know. Not yet, anyway. We need to figure out how to find out."

"I don't think we _can_ find out. He wouldn't do anything with us there."

Jiimo rolled his eyes. "Akite, have you _ever_ been on an undercover mission?"

"Um, unless you count the time the five of us snuck out of the Temple when we were eleven…"

Jiimo laughed so hard that he had to lean against the wall and I couldn't help being worried about him.

"Ak-kite, r-really. You need more ex-experience." He took a deep breath and stood straight again. "Okay, Akite, he isn't supposed to see us. No one is, because no one would think a Rodian is supposed to be in Kebro."

"Jiimo," I said sternly. "We're not doing this. There's no way we're going to follow somebody! We're not allowed to leave the palace, probably."

He gave me a half-disgusted-half-shocked look. "We did so many things that were explicitly forbidden when Dorn was alive, and now, you're refusing to do something because it _might_ make someone mad? Nobody told us not to leave the palace."

"They never thought to. They'd have to be crazy to guess that we'd even consider this!"

"Akite, tell me you're joking."

We looked at each other for a minute or two. And I knew that we'd be off on an insane mission within an hour. "Why do I let you guys talk me into these things?" I muttered, looking away, not thinking.

"It's only me, Akite," said Jiimo.

And that was why.


	22. Chapter 22

**22**

**

* * *

This is where things really get too much for Akite… Yes, she is acting a bit crazy. So would I. So would you.**

* * *

I was trying to decide what message I could leave Moyek and Master Sual when Jiimo came into my room with civilian clothes in his arms.

"Didn't anyone wonder _why_ you wanted those?"

"Nope."

I decided I wouldn't ask. I chose a loose shirt and black pants that looked like they could fit. I had trouble figuring out how I could conceal my lightsaber, but Jiimo helped.

I finally chose to tell Moyek what we were doing without telling her _exactly_ what we were doing. Nothing I could say would stop her from being furious, but I did my best. I saved it on my comm and left that on my bed for her to see. "Now, we just hope that we don't run into them on the way."

"We're not going to 'run into' anyone," Jiimo insisted.

_I wish._ "Jiimo, unless you have a plan, I think we might need some help."

"From who?"

"May I borrow your comm unit?" I asked.

He must have read the look in my eyes, because he handed it to me and muttered that he was going to return the extra clothes.

I held the comm for a long time without moving.

_He'll hate me._

_But this is war. We don't have the luxury of love. Jedi never do. They're always in their own war to keep the Republic in peace._

I finally called Kerai. "I need Daru," I said clearly. "Please. Important."

"Yes," she said.

There was a moment of yelling, and then, I heard Daru's voice. "Hello?"

"Daru!" I whispered.

"Oh. Oh, no. What's wrong?"

He sounded truly concerned. My knees melted, and I fell onto my bed. I couldn't have chosen a better person to fall in love with. "They killed Fang." My voice broke.

"I heard," he whispered.

"Zefel – Zefel killed herself."

"Oh." I could hear him hiss through his teeth. "I've been there, too. And there's nothing to say.

"You have?"

"I've known more than one person to commit suicide since this started. And more who were killed by other people."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Daru – I need help."

"I can imagine."

"Not that. I think somebody here is part of – of Fire-Wings' people." The translation of Taksayan would pass any key-word searchers or only-Okutushu speakers, at least. "He'll be on the streets now. I only have a hunch, but Jiimo's here, and he agrees. We want to find out for sure."

"Do you want me –?"

"I want you to meet me somewhere. Sechiru is too far."

"Akite, what is your master going to say?"

"I'll find out later."

"Akite." His voice was stern. "Are you in any shape to do this?"

I knew the answer. It was an incredibly bad answer for a Jedi, but I'd deal with that later. "I don't care."

* * *

Jiimo got me out of the palace without anyone but the guard at the gate noticing, and we "convinced" him that he didn't need to be concerned with us.

My heart started pounding the moment we stepped away from the gate. I was in Kebro without Moyek to protect me. I was practically alone. Jiimo is hardly older than I am.

I had to lead the way because Jiimo had no idea what this part of the city looked like. I knew it well – better than Coruscant – better than any place in the galaxy besides the Temple. This place. Why? Why should I know a place that destroys so much so well?

I led Jiimo to the intersection where Daru had agreed to meet us. We went without looking anywhere but straight ahead. I wasn't Moyek. I couldn't save people.

I finally looked around when we came to the intersection. I saw no one.

No one.

I think I almost cried then. I had given myself an impossible task that could get me killed whether I succeeded or not. And I had brought Jiimo with me. _What_ was I doing?"

"Akite!"

Daru! He was walking quickly down the street, followed by Kerai and another Mibir. My eyes stung with tears. I wanted to hug him, but I couldn't.

We looked at each other. I dried my eyes. "This is Jiimo. This is Daru and Kerai and –"

"Kaoritsu," Daru supplied and led us to the side of the street. Kaoritsu had Daru's sword in his belt. Why had Daru given up that sword? He had really wanted it. Unless it was for me – because he couldn't have me –

"Do you know how you're going to find your person?" Daru asked me.

"I – I thought I could use the Force. But it's a big city…"

He sighed.

_I don't have a plan,_ I admitted to myself. "I don't know. I can't – it isn't possible."

"It might be."

"It's a _huge_ city. He has a head start. No, it's _not_ possible. And do we even know that this'll do anything?"

"Nothing we do helps. It only affects a few people. That could end up affecting the whole city in the end… we hope." Daru put a hand on my shoulder. "Let's do _something_. Let's not run away."

I _had_ been running away. Under the pretense of trying to prove something, I ran away from the things I couldn't handle. I started to cry.

Kaoritsu said something. "No crying on the streets," Daru translated.

"We _can_ do this," Jiimo said. I'm pretty sure it'd be possible. But can we please go somewhere? Standing is an invitation…" His hand was on his lightsaber.

What had _he_ been through?

We started walking together. And I started wondering. Each of us had suffered somehow, seen horrors. And none of us shared all those experiences. No matter how well we could ever get to know each other, there would always be things we didn't know. But that didn't mean that we didn't understand each other – because we had all had bad times.

So, with a funny sense of comradeship, we walked down the dusty street.


	23. Chapter 23

**23**

Jiimo and I started talking after a block. What could we do to find one person in a city? We agreed that there were more people than we actually saw, but there weren't many. We agreed, without daring to say so, that Zefel would have done this better than we could. But we didn't have Zefel. We only had ourselves.

After three blocks, and enormous Mibir dropped in front of us, blocking the street entirely. I had seen this move so many times, but Moyek's presence had always protected me from having been on _this_ side of it.

The Mibir asked something in Okutushu, indicating me and Jiimo with one hand. As Kerai replied, I nervously turned around to see who was behind us. There was a female Mibir and three Hssak, all looking at us.

So they weren't the Mibir-only type. Daru started to speak, and I heard the word "Taksayan." Maybe he knew them.

The Mibir folded his wings and passed us walking sideways, so he didn't turn his back to us, another common move.

"He wanted to know why a Rodian was here," Daru explained. "I've met him before. His _itaka_ is practically the only one with Mibir and Hssak. He says he doesn't know if he believes in Taksayan, but if we find him, we should hit him an extra time from this _itaka_."

The Mibir and Hssak went in the opposite direction from us. We turned right at the next intersection. We didn't get a block down before a large group of Zabrak materialized from the buildings. Daru cursed.

One woman turned to me and spat something in her language. She glared at Jiimo.

Fury welled inside me. Jiimo was a Jedi and I was a Jedi and we had no part in this inter-species hatred.

Daru shouted and stepped closer to me. I wish I could have understood what he was saying, because it sounded good. We backed into a circle, and the other Zabrak surrounded us.

"Lightsabers," Daru said.

Jiimo and I drew and ignited together. The woman who had spoken to me went from showing disgust to surprise to anger.

"Jedi," she spat.

"Aya," I replied. It's true.

A blaster appeared in her hand. I heard a squeal of pain from somebody behind me. "Never attack a Jedi with a blaster," I warned, but she couldn't understand the words and didn't pick up on the tone.

Her fingers had just set the blaster and were about to move to the trigger when my lightsaber flashed out and knocked it away from her. I spun and knocked a long knife from a man's hand. We were outnumbered about two to one, but we had Jedi and all they had were blasters and weapons they hardly knew how to use. It only took us half a minute to convince them that fighting was inadvisable.

They backed away. Daru said something, picked up a blaster, and led us away. Kaoritsu collected three blasters from the ground and left the Zabrak with some final warning.

"Quickly," Daru said. "Nobody wants to see a Rodian here. The northwest city has a few, but we don't have any."

We jogged. I couldn't stop thinking about the woman. _Your kind killed Fang. Your kind killed my best friends._

Finally, Daru stopped. Kerai slid a piece of metal into a crack on the opening side of a door and laboriously pushed it half open.

We squeezed through the door, and Kerai closed it behind us. The windows were boarded up, so we hardly had any light. But I could tell that there weren't any dead bodies around us, so I was all right.

"We've used this place a few times," Daru explained. "We'll be pretty safe. Can you do what you need to do?"

"I think so," Jiimo said.

* * *

I couldn't have done it without Jiimo and Jiimo couldn't have done it without me. But we did it together. We found Iru Tokan a few blocks away with a group of people we couldn't identify. I wasn't sure that the five of us could take on a larger group that was as well trained as we were, and we knew that Tokan had an _itaka_ that would be very good. But we could follow and watch, we hoped.

And we did. It was an insane plan and we knew it, but we followed the feeling of Tokan's presence. We kept Jiimo in the center of our group so fewer people would bother us – though the fact that there were equal numbers of Zabrak and Mibir must have been eye-catching. We passed some people without being stopped. We passed half-demolished buildings and others, still standing, that must have held bodies behind their shattered, non-boarded windows. We passed a grenade that we saw go off down a side street. We passed it all with single-minded blindness.

That day, I don't think I was a Jedi, despite my anti-speciesist arguments.

When we finally came close to the ever-moving Tokan and the eight Mibir he was with, Daru drew us into a broken building. "We can't let him see us," he explained.

Kerai chewed on the side of her thumb. Kaoritsu gripped Daru's sword hilt. Daru watched me, and Jiimo stood with his hand on my arm. I closed my eyes and reached into the Force.

The world splintered into the lines of connection of the Force. I searched for Tokan. He was only a few buildings down, so I didn't have to stretch to study the lines running to and from him. I was mildly disappointed. I had known that he wouldn't be a shatterpoint – not at the exact moment I happened to look at him – but he hardly had enough connections to become one as important as I would have liked.

_Well, that's a simplistic way of thinking about them,_ I scolded myself. When everything lines up just right, something very small can take very great significance. Tokan didn't need many connections to become one.

I had just hoped that he would be more important.

I needed justification.

We sat and waited. Kerai and Kaoritsu became even twitchier until Daru gently reminded me that they didn't have my Force-perception.

"He's getting closer…" We crouched instinctively and held our breaths. "He turned the corner." We relaxed; there was another building between us and him. "How far behind him do you think we'd have to be for him not to notice us?"

"Two or three blocks," Daru said darkly. "I'm serious. They're well-trained warriors. They'll notice if someone is following them."

I shook my head. "Sorry, but no. One. Two, at the most."

Daru gave me the sternest look I have ever received from him. "Akite, I know you're the Jedi, but I know this city and its fighters. One block and he'll notice something wrong in a few minutes."

I was uncertain but not ready to show it again. I gazed back at him as sternly as he gazed at me. But I looked away.

Daru. I couldn't argue with _Daru_, and not because he knew Kebro better than I ever would.

"But, Akite, um…" Jiimo began.

We all looked at him.

"Do we _want_ to be caught, maybe?"

Did we? I didn't think so. Not with the odds we had.

I shook my head.

"Oh." He sounded almost disappointed.

"What's wrong?"

"That would have made it easier."

"That's not like you," I said, but it probably was. I'm sure Jiimo doesn't have a quarter the bravado he has when telling a story than when he is really in danger.

_What possessed me to lead him into something like this?_ I wondered. _What kind of friend _am_ I?_

But it was too late to turn back. "End of the block," I said. "Turned right – they're across the block from us."

"Let's wait a little longer, okay?" Daru asked.

I began to nod, then froze. "Zabrak," I said. "Three of them.

I felt Jiimo slip into the Force next to me, though he isn't as sensitive as I am. We waited anxiously. If the Mibir didn't do anything, our arguments were compromised, if not disproved. If they _did_, we might not want to watch.

Exactly what _did_ happen was unclear, but we felt a surge of hate from a mass of people, and the Zabrak chose to run.

"Well, _that_ was inconclusive," I said.

"For us. Not them," Jiimo pointed out. I almost smiled, but that wasn't a time for smiling.

"Well?" I asked. "They're halfway down the block. Can we go?"

"And do what?" Daru asked.

I couldn't answer.


	24. Chapter 24

**24**

**

* * *

Raise your hand if you've ever spent six hours trying to get to sleep for no good reason! Insomnaics unite!**

**In other words, I decided that the final editing/checkover that I usually do the evening I post would probably be counterproductive tonight, so if anything has slipped, please forgive me and my three hours of sleep.**

* * *

Miraculously, the five of us found a balance between moving quietly and appearing confident. We kept our distance from Tokan, though.

What _would_ we do? If we had all been Jedi, I think we would definitely be able to win, but the other three fought differently than Jiimo and I. I wasn't sure if we could coordinate.

I found myself wishing that Kaoritsu was Fang, Kerai Zefel, and Daru… well, I think I'd take Daru over Dorn any day. But I would have liked more Jedi. And my friends alive.

And this knowledge that my plans would not work and would be a shame to the Jedi if they _did_ to go away.

Who had I become?

But, I reasoned, I could work that out later, because I had to finish what I had started. I couldn't bring Daru, Kerai, Kaoritsu, and Jiimo out here and then turn back before we had done anything.

Though some voice in my head said that they would prefer it. _I_ would be ashamed.

Pride. The bane of any Jedi and any leader.

Of which I was both.

* * *

What_ am I going to do?_

We had followed Tokan for four blocks. He hadn't actually done anything except snarl at some Hssak and send them fleeing.

But the fact that he _could_ send Hssak fleeing made me sure that facing him would be a bad idea. I was losing confidence. I realized how fortunate we had been not to have come close to other Jedi who might have recognized us or felt us through the Force, thought we were a master-padawan pair, and decided to come talk to us. We were just as lucky not to have run into another hostile group.

It was probably the gathering clouds that were responsible for driving away fighters. I could tell this was going to be one of the bigger storms.

"It'll be nice to get rid of the dust," Daru commented.

"Eh. Get us wet. And dustier, once we dry," I returned.

Daru shrugged.

I felt a Zabrak _itaka_ – armed – approach Tokan. "Jiimo," I whispered. These weren't three Zabrak that Tokan could intimidate away. These were dangerous.

"What?" asked Kerai.

"Zabrak _itaka_," I whispered.

"Show your hands," Daru muttered as if reciting instructions. "Look down if there are any Hssak. Assure them. Never pick a fight. Your job is to break them up."

I felt sick deep in my stomach. "I'm not sure Tokan follows those rules."

We stopped around the corner from where Tokan's group met the Zabrak _itaka_. Kerai watched them with one eyes that she snuck around the corner. The rest of us put on the appearance of lounging against a boarded-up building, but I can guarantee that Daru and Kaoritsu were on the alert, and I know that Jiimo and I were watching in our own way.

The Zabrak didn't run. That, I knew, was a bad sign. The scent of confrontation rolled down the cloud-dimmed streets.

"Never pick a fight," Daru whispered again. "_Never_ pick a fight. That's contrary to our _duty_." I sensed his hands clenching. "It's _wrong_.Those Zabrak aren't hurting anybody."

"Not right now," said Jiimo, which was true.

And the fighting began.

_What do we _do? I looked at Jiimo, then Daru, then Kaoritsu. Defending my race and doing the Jedi thing, the right thing, breaking up the fight, would show us. Not only would we be unwelcome to Tokan, but we weren't supposed to be out there. Tokan had the Jedi and the palace on his side. Not to mention half the Mibir and anyone who hated Jedi.

But it was immediately clear that, although the Mibir only outnumbered them nine to eight, the Zabrak were going to lose.

I cringed as a Zabrak fell. They were using swords and the Mibir were using poles, which were awkward, and blasters, which could be difficult at close range, and the Mibir had to protect their wings, but they were well trained. The Zabrak weren't. Through the Force, I saw one Mibir leave his guard open for a moment, but no Zabrak took the opportunity. The lines of Force jumped and twisted and reshaped, making tiny, momentary shatterpoints, but only I knew.

"With the Zabrak backing us, maybe we could win," I whispered.

"We have two Mibir and a Rodian," Daru replied shortly.

Oh.

Daru gripped my hand. I squeezed back, though I knew this was a declaration of love.

The last five Zabrak surrendered. The Mibir stripped them of their weapons and waited for them to take their four wounded away.

"That's against regulations," Daru protested when I told him, but we knew Tokan didn't care.

That was hope for my plan, at least.


	25. Chapter 25

**25**

**

* * *

I guess I got cold feet about this chapter – I've felt uncomfortable about the story for a while, which is why I stopped begging for reviews. I was afraid of the negative ones, though I know that we sometimes need them. So didn't have the courage to post this on Friday, but I'll give it to you now as a Christmas present. Chapter 25 on the 25****th****.**

**Sorry about the mangled English.**

* * *

There was a pause after the Zabrak fled. The Mibir finally started walking again. We decided to start moving before someone decided to bother us.

We weren't quite a block behind them, but we were careful to walk slowly. We fell a bit farther back.

Tokan was good; I had almost no warning of his intentions. With speed most Jedi would envy, he spun backwards around a corner and whipped his wings open, glaring at us with all the power and size of his species backing him.

Kerai said some words that I do not want to know the translation for. The rest of us skipped words and put our hands on our weapons, though I think the other four were waiting for me to draw. None of us even considered running.

"_Jedi,_" Tokan spat. "Is the palace where? Here?"

I didn't have an answer to that. We _were_ supposed to be at the palace.

"Are you here why, not palace? Confused? Is master who? _Those_?"

I hadn't heard someone who spoke Basic so badly speak it at all on Okutu, other than a few words here and there. Everyone who couldn't speak Basic didn't. So why would he?

So he could talk to Jiimo and me. But mostly me.

"Hurt not enough? Want pain more for Jedi? Want die also? No. Go the palace. Fast. Be safe, true?"

Was he threatening me or warning me? I decided to ask my original question. "Those Zabrak. Why did you fight them?"

He moved towards me, his wings still outstretched. Behind each wing, another Mibir stood, and I could see the other six behind them.

"They not do right."

"And what's right? Why did you fight? Our job isn't to fight."

Several Mibir snarled. "Job is fight, me," Tokan said.

"Does Tiku Lasir agree?" I challenged.

I heard another deep growl as he took another step forwards. "Job _me_, not _him_. You understand?"

"He gave it to you," I reminded him. I realized that I was sweating. We were teenagers, and I knew that the adult Mibir could kill us all in battle.

"It's his job to decide what to do," I argued.

Tokan muttered something about Tiku Lasir.

Something very impolite.

And Daru spoke at last. "People who follow Lasir are the only thing that keeps this city sane. What do _you_ want? You like insanity? You like killing?"

Tokan stepped forwards again. If he had swung his wings out, he could have swept all five of us towards him. "Fight, I like." He fixed his eyes on mine. "Zabrak. Fight _Zabrak_."

"You're insane," I declared. Why does Tiku Lasir trust you?"

"I help, true? I help _Mibir_. He help all. _He_ is 'insane'. True? Zabrak? Hssak? Planets you have _some_. Planets _we_ have _one_. True? You are – are – want all. True? Only Humans better."

"Then –"

"Go palace. Safe, Zabrak Rodian. Go."

"Then you _admit_ that you don't support – don't –" Something was too easy here.

"Admit? I tell _you_. Can hear who? Child. Five child. Rain come, streets no people. Child hear. Jedi child, still child. Go palace. Tell Lasir. He listen?"

"Yes," I said confidently, but I wasn't entirely sure how much Tiku Lasir trusted Tokan.

"You go not palace? All Zabrak same, true? _Go._"

I could have gone. I had my evidence. But he was right. We were the only ones to see; at least, the only ones who would tell anyone. Complacency or malice would silence the rest. Nobody would agree with us at all except Zabrak who had been his victims, and who wouldn't think they had a grudge against Mibir? So Tiku Lasir liked me, but the courts…?

So I asked:

"Who is Taksayan?"

He goggled at me for a moment. I gripped my lightsaber hilt. But instead of attacking, he began to laugh.

"Taksayan!" Iru Tokan shouted. "He is who? _Who?_ Nobody! Never. He is name. He is – is – is story. Story for help Mibir."

"Yes, I know, but someone is calling himself Taksayan now," I insisted.

He rested amused eyes on me. "No. You understand wrong. Taksayan Jedi hunt, Taksayan is story."

"I'm talking about the Taksayan out there now. Not the original one. The one we hear about killing Zabrak. The one with the _itaka Samudri_…"

He spoke slowly and clearly. "He. Is. Story. Story called after story. Jedi believe, we not understand why. We not believe. Jedi and Lasir believe only. Story for us."

He leaned forwards. "_I_ am Taksayan, here is Samudri. Taksayan, he is a hundred. Every one. Every leader, he is Taksayan if he fight Zabrak. Every _itaka_, it is Samudri, if it fight Zabrak!"

Was that true? _Was_ there no Taksayan, no easy answer to Kebro?

Tokan snapped something at his companions. He pulled his wings to his body, and they all moved next to him so they blocked the streets themselves. He opened his wings again behind them.

They held metal staffs. They were too smart to use blasters against us. _Surely _we could cut through in one stroke, but if we _missed_, those would _hurt_.

And we had heard too much by now. Taksayan was something that any information was valuable for. We would be believed on that.

And there were only five of us, and the nine Mibir were huge.

I sank into the Force searching for a shatterpoint. I had half a second to find something to save us – or, better, something to justify our crazy mission. Half a second or less.

Something entered my mind that Master Windu had told me when he had taught me to use shatterpoints. "It's not always so simple. Sometimes, when you don't see one, it's because you're looking for the wrong thing or at the wrong time."

My six-year-old mind had accepted that too calmly, never guessing that this problem would threaten my life and, possibly, a planet. I knew this wasn't the wrong time – what other time was there? But the wrong place…?

Would killing one Taksayan help anything? What _could_ I do? How _could_ I unravel the problem of Okutu?

Where was the solution?

My lightsaber leapt to my hand and ignited, and Jiimo echoed my move, green with blue. The others drew a sword and blasters.

I gazed at Taksayan through the green fire of my blade.

"Child," he whispered, sorrow creeping through his hatred.

This hatred had killed Fang. It had killed Zefel. It would kill me.

And something else Master Windu had told me, something my six-year-old brain had discounted.

"I know you won't listen or understand now, but sometime you'll need to remember this. Sometimes, you don't see a shatterpoint because _there isn't one_."

Staring through my lightsaber, I knew.

There was no shatterpoint. Not for Okutu. Not for Kebro. Not for this section of the city. Not just that there was no easy solution.

There _was no solution_.

Because the people fought or watched indifferently.

Because we could not change them. Not in this time. Not in war.

But there was a shatterpoint in this situation. This one, insignificant situation. I could win; I could take one Taksayan; I could see how. It was in _my_ hands, that was why I could not see it before. I had looked in the wrong place for the wrong thing. I could strike it. All I had to do was swing my lightsaber out – just like _that_, then turn it like _that_ so Tokan wouldn't be prepared, and his _itaka_ wouldn't be able to take it. They would fight, but not win. I could do it.

But I didn't.

_Which would you have yourself become?_

Because it was _my_ shatterpoint, too.

I opened my hands. My finger slid off the on/off switch, and the green fire vanished. My lightsaber hilt hit the ground, bounced, spun, and skittered to a stop.


	26. Chapter 26

**26**

**

* * *

Happy New Year!**

**The chapter of unanswered moral and philosophical questions…**

* * *

Everyone stared at me. I stared at the ground. Suddenly, a sob tore out of my body, and I collapsed.

"Akite!" Jiimo shouted. "What did you _do_ to her?"

Daru dropped to his knees and put his arms around me. He spoke warningly in Okutushu to Tokan.

Slowly, I felt Iru Tokan lower his wings. "Child," he whispered.

But he was wrong. I wasn't a child. None of us were. We held responsibility, the power to injure or kill, and we used it. The things we had seen, the things we had done, the things we _could_ do had banished childhood.

I clung to Daru and cried.

I was surrounded by hate and destruction. How close I had come to joining it. But I wasn't going to add to anything that could make another Fang die. Another Zefel.

Children don't make those choices.

I felt the downrush of giant wings, but I still sensed Tokan in front of me, unmoving. His companions were leaving.

I just cried.

Finally, I noticed two new Force-sensitive presences nearby, but I didn't have the strength to get up and face Moyek and Master Sual.

"_Akite!_ What in the Force-cursed _galaxy_ –"

Moyek stopped. I could feel her taking in the sight of me crying in Daru's arms with the two young Mibir, Jiimo, and Iru Tokan watching silently.

"Akite," she whispered. She gently pulled me from Daru's embrace. "Akite?"

I shook my head.

Another downrush – Tokan launching himself into the air. Nobody thought to stop him.

I felt Master Sual pull Jiimo aside and ask him something. Jiimo replied. I shouldn't have left him to explain alone, but I was still on the ground, held by Moyek and Daru.

Finally, I felt the first drops of rain. I wondered if Tokan was ahead of the storm. I wasn't sure why I cared.

But I did.

Because he was just a person. A person that had chosen the wrong response to tragedy.

The storm broke, bloodrain pouring down, soaking my hair and clothes, washing my face clean of tears as quickly as I shed them. Daru moved closer as if to shield me, but I was beyond wanting or needing that.

My tears slowed, then stopped. I licked rain from my lips, dust and all.

Because it was just rain. Rain that had picked up something perfectly natural from the environment. There was no malice – only sentient creatures were far enough from nature to feel that there was. In fact, there was just the opposite. Bloodrain, like all rain, brings _life_.

* * *

We walked back to the palace through the pouring rain. Nobody spoke. Nobody even suggested that Daru, Kaoritsu, or Kerai shouldn't come with us.

The guards at the gate asked no questions. Just Moyek's look made them let us all in.

We streamed bloodrain over the golden-yellow floor in the entry of the consciously anti-red palace. There, we awoke. I finally pulled out of the Force, relieved to stop seeing the billions of connections it showed me, frightened to lose its clarity. Kerai finally spoke, shattering the haunted silence.

"Of course you belong here," Master Sual responded to her complaint. "You've fought for us. You've done more than we have."

Someone came to dry us off. All seven of us reported to Tiku Lasir. I think that meeting him had been Daru's fondest dream, but at that moment, he felt nothing.

_Why?_ I wondered as Jiimo and Daru related my hopeless, grief-crazed mission. _I_ had started it. _I_ had made the choice.

Well, they _could_ have stopped me.

I still remember what Tiku Lasir said about Iru Tokan when they were finished. He always – in our language, what we would say means that his words were slippery."

"A silvertongue," Moyek offered.

"Yes, that is good. But I believed that I knew which of his words were true. I could have been mistaken on some. What mistakes to make!"

I spoke for the first time since before I had dropped my lightsaber, which Moyek now carried. "Who would you have believed?"

He looked only at me. "You."

"Me?"

"You. Your masters were uninvolved. Your friends I do not know. Tokan does not have honesty. You do. I would have believed what you said.

_So that was for nothing?_ "What can we do?" I asked pleadingly.

"Nothing, perhaps. I may order his arrest. He may be arrested. But the courts, even in this time, are the authority. My trust in you does not constitute evidence."

I bowed my head. I had known he would get away since I had dropped my lightsaber. There was no hope for a trial in this place at this time. Who would believe the victims? Who else would stand up?

* * *

We – the Jedi – were sent to our rooms to clean up and rest. The other three were given rooms and clean clothes.

Moyek was sitting on my bed when I came out of my long shower. She held my lightsaber in her hands.

"Sit."

I sat next to her.

"Tell me about the colors of lightsabers."

I was taken entirely by surprise at this. "Well, Sith have red ones because we won't let them get real crystals, and Jedi have blue or green. And Master Windu has violet."

"Yes, but what do blue and green mean?"

"Life?"

"And Sith and Master Windu aren't _alive_?"

If she hadn't been so serious, I would have laughed. "No, it represents a dedication to life."

"All right, but that still excludes Master Windu, and that wasn't actually my question. Why does a Jedi choose the color she chooses?"

"It feels right."

"What does it mean?"

"Blue is for most Jedi – especially padawans. It represents – represents the will to fight to defend, but that's not fair to _us_, is it?"

"And green?"

"The will to teach, to study the Force more than fighting. But – well, I know I'd like to teach, but we don't really fit that."

"Do we? Are you missing something?"

I groped for the answer. My brain was exhausted.

"Perhaps," she said after an agonizing wait, "Green involves not fighting. Not physically. To find the other answers. To see the other ways."

"But – but Fang and – and Zefel were blue."

"I'm sure Fang would have grown out of it. It's just the young Jedi's attraction to seeing visible strength as the answer. He was male."

He was also desperate to be seen as powerful even with his lack of strength in the Force. And he would never have agreed to teach.

"And I don't think Zefel ever saw any answers or ways."

I turned my head away. That was true.

"But you do. Even better than I do. So, perhaps, that is why your lightsaber is green." She tossed it to me. "Or it could just be a pretty color."

* * *

Moyek and I didn't speak more about what had happened. I admired her patience. I would have been burning to hear. We meditated for two hours. I tried to put my thoughts in order in preparation for answering her – or the Council's – questions.

We were going home.

But I wasn't sure what home would seem like anymore. I had lost too much in my months in Kebro – and gained too much.

When we returned from meditation, we ate with Jiimo, then met Daru, his friends, and Master Sual in Tiku Lasir's meeting room. The Tiku's face was unusually grim, but I'm sure he mirrored ours.

"Let me start by saying that we are not yet confident of our assessment of this, but there has been a notable occurrence," he told us. I could ell that "notable" was a terrible understatement. "Less than an hour ago, a bomb detonated at the base of an apartment building which several Zabrak families still inhabited. The building collapsed. Preliminary estimates claim forty to fifty death, but we will not know until the militia further investigates.

Moyek swore quietly next to me.

"At the site of the detonation, the militia found the remains of a person. The bioscans seem to indicate that this was Iru Tokan."

He let us work that out. My mind spun. Tokan was too smart to have been there accidentally, and it was a _Zabrak_ apartment.

"It sounds like he committed suicide," I said in surprise.

"And decided to take others with him," Tiku Lasir finished, nodding. "I believe that he may have been afraid of my reaction to what you would tell me."

"Or maybe he felt guilty – well, not _too_ guilty," Moyek commented.

Whatever his reason, I knew that it was my fault. I had chosen against it, but I had killed him all the same. This wasn't the first time I had come across the idea – it seems fairly common – but I had never entirely believed it.

"He killed himself, Akite. It wasn't your choice," Moyek told me as we left.

"And forty or fifty others!" I whispered, still in shock.

But had it been worth making my choice? One leader was gone. That was all. And he had killed so many.

But he could have killed more if I had let him live.

_Yes, it_ was_ worth it._ There are few enough Jedi. I was just one, but the galaxy needed me, and I couldn't have killed him in my anger without serious repercussions for me as a Jedi… I had done _right_.

Hadn't I?


	27. Chapter 27

**27**

**

* * *

The last chapter! Wow!  
**

* * *

"I guess we're leaving," Daru told me. He looked uncomfortable in the soft green clothes the palace had given him. "We have to get back to the streets. I'm sorry, but we _have_ to."

"You belong there," I told him. "We don't."

"Aren't you going out ever again?"

"Moyek might once or twice before we go, but we're going back to Coruscant for sure." I swallowed tears.

"I had hoped your Council had changed its mind…"

"No. We have to go."

He nodded. He understood, but I could hardly look at him.

"Akite, I don't know if it's allowed, but…" He was holding the sword that he had taken the day we had kissed – two days before. I had known this was coming.

I shook my head. "You keep it, okay? Use it. Think of me." I had to swallow again.

"I love you," he whispered. "Always.

I burst into tears at last. He pulled me close. I hugged him, but when he tried to kiss me, I turned my cheek to his lips.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. "Always."

"It's not your fault. You'll be a good Jedi."

I smiled through my tears. "I hope."

"I'll miss you."

* * *

"Keep the sword."

Moyek and Master Sual went out the next day, but Jiimo's master came to the palace, and all five of us were called home.

I managed to talk to Tiku Lasir before I left. "I am sorry that you must leave, but it is for the best," he admitted.

I nodded.

"You are an exceptional young woman," he continued. "One day, if this ends, if we are still alive, we will still need Jedi for Kebro. Are you permitted to ask your Council for a certain assignment?"

"Yes, but we don't always get it."

"Would you ask that you may return here?"

Return? To Kebro? To the violence? To the bloodrain?

To somebody who would trust me, not because I am a Jedi but because I earned it?

"Yes. I will."

* * *

Coruscant. The Jedi Temple. A new world, and not one I liked so much more than Kebro. There was war here. War of a different sort, but just as devastating.

The Council had Master Sual report first. Moyek told me to meditate until it was our turn, but it felt so foreign to be in the Temple with its unlimited supply of pure water, green plants, droids (_A droid?_ I thought as we came in. _Did I really see a _droid?), and imagined safety. I had just come in from another world, a red, sandy one, and I knew I would never entirely wash it off me.

The Council called us after Master Sual. The report was nothing for me; Moyek did all the talking. All I did was listen, look at the seven members – one a hologram – that had found time for us, and wonder what would happen when _I_ had to report to them.

The reason they hardly recognized my presence was that I was expected to report later. Alone.

This is every padawan's nightmare. If a padawan has experienced something worthy of sharing with the Council but its master has not, it is expected to give its own report. And the Council is possibly the most intimidating group of people in the galaxy.

"You'll be fine," Moyek told me after we left. Jiimo and his master were next.

"I don't _want_ to go without you," I protested. "I – I – You're my master. I don't feel like I'm _supposed_…"

"Yes. You are. More than supposed to. _Expected_ to. This is part of growing up. The padawan must learn to report without her master."

"It doesn't feel right. I don't know what to tell them, Moyek. I'm _scared_."

"It really isn't as scary as people make you think."

"But _you're_ practically Master Windu's friend!"

"Oh, Force," she groaned. "I don't know what's so scary about Master Windu to all of you!"

"That's because he _likes you_!"

"He doesn't exactly _dis_like _you_."

"Um," I said, thinking about a certain incident of eleven-year-old stupidity.

"Listen, Akite. A friend of mine once pointed out that, if you survived something – alone – that the Council finds this important, you can _certainly_ tell the story to twelve adults – fewer today. Even with Master Windu included."

She was right. She always is. "That's why I'm the master and you're the apprentice," she always tells me when I say so.

But I had no idea how to tell the story. I could not imagine what to say. Even as I made my shaking way to the Council room, I was desperately scrambling for the answer.

* * *

Finally, I walked into the room. Two more masters had come through hologram and one of the present masters had been replaced by another. Once, all twelve would have been physically present the entire time.

I tried to breathe calmly, not to show fear, but they can always sense fear.

"Padawan Akite Chairu," Master Windu stated. "You are here to tell us of our experiences and actions on Okutu."

And, suddenly, peace surrounded me, because I knew exactly what I would tell them.

The truth.

All of it.

I would leave nothing for them to pull out through painfully awkward questions – which I had really feared. So, instead of nodding and waiting for the questions to guide me, I began with the uncomfortable truth: "If there is anything I have hated in my life, it was that section of that city." Not Kebro. Not Okutu. I knew better.

And I talked.

* * *

I told them everything. Daru. Fang. Zefel. Tiku Lasir. Iru Tokan. Those baby Hssak. The girl I had comforted. My love, my despair, my anger. Everything.

They never interrupted me. They listened with no more than occasional nods to show that they understood when I was unsure. They even sent for a drink of water for me when I tired. One of the members across the hologram left partway through. The rest listened to every word.

They had no questions. When I finished, there was silence as they communicated, and that was all.

* * *

"_What_ were you _doing_ for _two hours_?" Moyek shouted at me when I came back to our room.

"Talking."

"_Two hours?_"

"I had a lot to say. They said you could listen to the recording."

She sighed and relaxed. "Thank you. But I don't have to hear it. Not to understand you. I know what all this is like. I do, Akite."

"I know," I whispered.

* * *

The Council agreed with me – there is no answer to Kebro's problem. Not now. They pulled every Jedi off the planet except Jans, Master Tirem, and two pairs in northwestern Kebro. We were more useful elsewhere. Okutu would no longer swallow our Jedi.

That doesn't mean we've escaped it. Master Sual swears that he will take no more padawans during the war. He doesn't want to be responsible for their deaths. I know I will never truly leave the planet that took my best friends and the last remnants of my childhood, but I may return. And I may want to.

* * *

The evening of my return, I visited Zefel's favorite place in the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Never again would she sit here, but I could still feel her presence in the stones and planets.

Zefel.

Zefel.

You were wrong. Not your prophecies. We never _did_ see each other again after I left for Okutu. And maybe the Jedi will die – maybe even in the near future.

But that doesn't mean that we can give up.

We must fight. The galaxy needs us to. It doesn't matter if we die. We don't have to fight with weapons. We have other ways as well.

I promise. I promise on your memory and Fang's that, no matter what situation I am in, no matter how hopeless, I will figure out how to fight. And I will never give up.


	28. Author's Note

**Author's Note**

**(Please notice that I also posted a chapter last Friday and read that as well as this.)  
**

**The situation in Kebro continued to deteriorate after Akite left. The Jedi that remained continued to make their presence known and began to recruit more helpers. However, there was soon almost nothing left to save. The Sechiru shelter was destroyed only two weeks after Akite left, killing two, injuring three, and destroying most of the stores of food and water for the Jedi's helpers.**

**The fires of hatred had nearly burned their areas of the city bare, so the fighters began to spread throughout Kebro. This expanding of the battlefield allowed the Jedi to recruit many more helpers, but it was clearly too late to stop the violence. Jans Zema was killed two months after Akite left and Master Tirem a month later.**

**As if in defiance of the Jedi's concern that they had orchestrated the violence in Kebro, the Seperatists invaded Okutu five months after Akite left the planet. Possibly, they had hoped to take over quickly and humiliate the Jedi by controlling Kebro as the Jedi had failed to. However, the planet was shocked enough by this new threat to band together, learn to use modern weapons, leave history behind (temporarily), and repel it. The fighting against the Separatists and the following peace in Kebro's streets lasted until the Empire was declared.**

**The Empire blatantly encouraged racism, and Okutu was an easy target. Humans were recognized as a main species of the planet and Shinsayama and Mibir lost this status. Zabrak on colonial worlds were treated well and Hssak were powerful, so these species, along with Humans, were encouraged to steal from, kill, and discriminate against the "weak" Shinsayama and "unworthy" Mibir. With all the hatred against them for what they had done to Zabrak in Kebro, the Mibir suffered more than almost any species in the Empire.**

**Daru Onhu and surviving members of his **_**itaka**_** formed an underground resistance group to protect Mibir. At first, he had nearly free reign of the burned-over, guerilla-run southern city, but the palace's influence drew families back to the buildings that were inhabitable, and he was forced into further secrecy. Mibir were not allowed to resettle, and simply their presence there was suspect. Daru continued to run resistance in Kebro until the Empire was overthrown.**

**Chisu Lasir was still the Chief of Security when the Empire took over, but he was soon forced to resign. He and his family joined the Rebellion. For several years, he co-led the Rebellion on Okutu, recruiting pro-Mibir groups, including Daru's. He also outlived the Empire, though his two children did not. It was several years before racism cooled enough for him to reenter politics, but he could only work in the main capital of Okutu and never rise to a high position. Mibir were not welcome in Kebro again for his entire life.**

**

* * *

If you are curious about Akite and have not read my other stories about her, there are four others of various lengths to choose from. A week from now, I will post another. I hope some of you will be there to read it.**


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